1  Jl1 

—  —  —  —  '-         —  —  Y 

1  UNIVERS 

AT 

>!TY  OF  CALIFORNIA   j 
LOS  ANGELES 

GK(  )RGE  WASHINGTON 


HALF-HOURS 


IN 


SOUTHERN  HISTORY 


BY 


JNO:  LESSLIE  HALL,  PH.  D. 

PROFESSOR  or  ENGLISH  AND  or 
GENERAL  HISTORY  IN  THK 
COLLSGE  OF  WILLIAM  AND  MARY 


B.  F.  JOHNSON  PUBLISHING  CO. 

ATLANTA          RICHMOND          DALLAS 


Copyright,  1907, 

By  B.  F.  JOHNSON  PUBLISHING  CO. 
All  rights  reserved. 


To 


.  7  .    Ji- 


Lti 


PREFACE 


This  is  a  book  of  sketches  and  might  be  entitled,  A  Sketch 
Book  of  Southern  History.    It  aims  to  give  in  brief  outline  the 

J*"    salient  features  of  Southern  heroism  and  achievement,  and  to 

in 

N    state  rapidly  the  South's  side  of  the  long  controversy  between 

z   the  sections. 

The  author  has  tried  to  be  fair,  candid,  and  truthful.    Ex- 
ert   tremists  of  either  section  will  not  like  the  volume.    The  fact 
jj>    that  he  is  a  Southerner,  however,  the  author  will   attempt 
•£   neither  to  palliate  nor  to  deny ;  but  he  has  aimed  to  write  "with 
oe   malice  toward  none,  with  charity  for  all." 
V       The  facts  stated  in  this  volume  have  been  gathered  from  a 
thousand  sources ;  none  have  been  manufactured.    Of  Southern 
i    civilization,  the  author  speaks  from  experience,  as  he  remem- 
bers vividly  two  generations  that  represented  the  Old  South 
2    so-called.    The  work  is  a  labor  of  love ;  its  object,  justice  to  all. 

<        WILLIAMSBURG,  VAV  March  31,  1907, 


CONTENTS 


PAGE 

ILLUSTRATIONS   13 

CHAPTER  I 

PAGE 

THE  SOUTH  IN  OLDEN  DAYS 15 

"BEFORE  THE  WAR" 15 

NO  "SOLID"  SOUTH 17 

"THERE  is  GLORY  ENOUGH  FOR  us  ALL" 19 

ROANOKE  ISLAND,  ST.  AUGUSTINE,  AND  JAMESTOWN.  .  .  21 

"SIC  SEMPER  TYRANNIS" 2/ 

Harvey  and  Berkeley 27 

George  III  and  His  "Friends" 30 

Taxation  Without  Representation  30 

"Treason !  Treason !" 33 

VIRGINIA  AND  CAROLINA 36 

Tea  Parties 36 

Mecklenburg  and  St.  John's  Church 41 

INDEPENDENCE    44 

1772  and  1775 44 

The  Year  1776 46 

THE  SOUTH  IN  THE  WAR  OF  THE  REVOLUTION 51 

Heroes  and  Heroines 51 

Maryland    •. 51 

Virginia    52 

North  Carolina  59 

South  Carolina    63 

Georgia  68 

Heroes  of  the  Frontier 71 

[7] 


HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 


Troops  and  Battles 72 

Miscellaneous 74 

THE  SOUTH  AND  THE  CONSTITUTION 78 

The  Federal  Convention  of  1787 78 

The  States  Create  the  Union 83 

THE  SOUTH'S  PART  IN   MAINTAINING  AND  EXPANDING 

THE   UNION 86 

The  War  of  1812 86 

The  Mexican  War 90 

Miscellaneous 96 


CHAPTER  II 

PAGE 

THE  HOMES  THAT  MADE  HEROES 98 

"TRUTH  is  MIGHTY  AND  WILL  PREVAIL" 98 

THE  SOUTH'S  HISTORY  WRITTEN  BY  HER  ENEMIES.  ...  99 

TIRED  OF  HEARING  HIM  CALLED  "THE  JUST" IO4 

CULTURE  AND  REFINEMENT IO5 

MANLINESS  AND  SELF-RELIANCE  IO8 

"OLE  MARSTER" 1 1 1 

"OLE  MISTIS" 1 14 

THE  PLANTER  CIVILIZATION 1 16 

THE  CAVALIER  AND  THE  PURITAN 119 

THE  YEOMANRY  OF  THE  SOUTH 123 

TRUTH,  PURITY,  AND  PIETY  126 

SLAVERY  IN  THE  SOUTH  13! 

THE  FEUDAL  BARON 134 

THE  "LAZY"  PLANTER 138 

UNCLE  TOM'S  CABIN  AND  OTHER  SLURS 142 

"OF  THE  OLD  SCHOOL" 144 


CONTENTS 


CHAPTER  III 

PAGB 

THE  HUNDRED  YEARS'  WRANGLE 146 

EARLY  CAUSES  OF  ESTRANGEMENT 146 

Lights  and  Shadows 146 

Views  of  the  Constitution   150 

The  League  or  Compact  Theory 150 

The  Partnership  View 153 

Federalists  and  Anti-Federalists  156 

LATER  CAUSES  OF  ESTRANGEMENT 158 

THE  GREATEST  CAUSE  OF  ESTRANGEMENT 1 62 

Slavery  in  the  North  and  the  South 162 

The  North  Sells  Out 165 

Who  Did  Sin? 167 

"The  Higher  Law"   173 

A  New  God  Demanded 174 

The  Plot  Thickens 175 

The  Last  Straw 179 

THE  RIGHT  OF  SECESSION l8l 

New  England  Pioneers  of  Secession 181 

Late  New  England  Secessionists 185 

Nullification  in  the  North 189 

"THE  WAR" 192 

CHAPTER  IV 

PAGE 

THE  PRIVATE  SOLDIER  AND  THE  SAILOR 197 

THE  REAL  HERO 197 

WHO  ? 198 

WHY  ? 199 

"GIDEON'S  BAND"  200 

MR.  ROOSEVELT  EXPLAINS 2OI 

"WEARIED  OUT  BY  THEIR  OWN  VICTORIES" 203 

THE  SOLDIER'S  JOYS 204 

"WHAT  is  LIFE  WITHOUT  HONOR?" 205 


10  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

CHRIST  IN  THE  CAMP 2O7 

"PIRATES"  ,  208 


CHAPTER  V 

PAGB 

THE  WOMEN  OF  THE  CONFEDERACY 215 

THE  TRUEST  PATRIOTS 213 

WIVES  AND  MOTHERS  OF  HEROES .  214 

THE  RECRUITING  OFFICER 2l6 

"THE  UNCROWNED  QUEENS  OF  THE  SOUTH" 217 

"STITCH,  STITCH,  STITCH" 219 

"GALLANT  BLACK  TOM"  AND  TREACHEROUS  ISAAC  ....  221 

WAR  POETS  OF  THE  SOUTH 222 

"STARVATION  PARTIES"  223 

"A  MINISTERING  ANGEL  THOU"  22$ 

CUPID  AND  "GENERAL  LEE'S  SOCKS" 226 

A  STARVING  NATION  22/ 

THE  "TRIUMPHAL  MARCH"  THROUGH  GEORGIA 230 

THE  WOMEN  DECLINE  TO  SURRENDER 232 

HEROINES  IN  HOMESPUN 234 

HER  MONUMENTS  AND  HISTORIES 236 


CHAPTER  VI 

PAGE 

LEE  AND  His  PALADINS  240 

LEE  GOES  WITH  HIS  STATE 240 

THE  HALL  OF  FAME  24! 

"MARYLAND,  MY  MARYLAND"  244 

MARYE'S  HEIGHTS  AND  CHANCELLORSVILLE 245 

"ALL  THE  WORLD  WONDERED" 247 

GRAPPLE  OF  THE  GIANTS 250 


CONTENTS  11 


CHAPTER  VII 

PAGE 

JACKSON  AND  His  "FOOT-CAVALRY" 253 

"POOR  WHITE  TRASH" 253 

JACKSON'S  POLITICAL  VIEWS 254 

"STONEWALL" 255 

THE  TRUE  STONEWALL  JACKSON 257 

THE  THUNDERBOLT  OF  WAR 260 

CHAPTER  VIII 

PAOE 

SHILOH  AND  ITS  HEROES 262 

THE  HERO  OF  TEXAS 262 

"FREEDOM  SHRIEKED  WHEN  KOSCIUSKO  FELL" 263 

"COMMON  ERRORS"   264 

CHAPTER  IX 

PAGE 

THE  SOUTH  SINCE  THE  WAR 266 

A  PROSTRATE  NATION  266 

THE  WOLF  AT  THE  DOOR 268 

THE  HOUNDS  OF  PEACE 2/O 

THE  REIGN  OF  TERROR 2/2 

THE  FREEDMAN'S  BUREAU 274 

THE  SCHOOLMARM  IN  TRADITION 275 

RECONSTRUCTION  THROUGH  DESTRUCTION 277 

THE  CARPETBAGGER  AND  THE  SCALAWAG 280 

THE  THIRD  TRIUMVIRATE 282 

THE  KU  KLUX  KLAN 285 

RECONSTRUCTION  BY  THE  SOUTHERN  PEOPLE 287 

THE  RACE  PROBLEM  2QI 

MORALS  AND  RELIGION 2Q7 

ZACCHEUS  IS  COMING  DOWN 3O1 


12  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

CHAPTER  X 

PAGE 

CONCLUSION  305 

Recapitulation  305 

Patriotism 307 

INDEX   311 


ILLUSTRATIONS 


OPPOSITE 
PAGK 

GEORGE  .WASHINGTON  (frontispiece)   

JOHN  MARSHALL l6 

PATRICK  HENRY 32 

THOMAS  JEFFERSON 48 

JAMES  MADISON 80 

JAMES  MONROE , 96 

ANDREW    JACKSON    128 

JEFFERSON   DAVIS l6o 

HENRY  CLAY 176 

JOHN  C.  CALHOUN 192 

J.  E.  B.  STUART 2O8 

JOSEPH    E.    JOHNSTON    224 

R.   E.    LEE 240 

T.  J.  JACKSON 256 

ALBERT  SIDNEY  JOHNSTON 264 

N.  B.  FORREST    .                                                                                               ,  288 


[13-L  B] 


Half -Hours  In  Southern  History 

CHAPTER  I 

THE  SOUTH  IN  OLDEN  DAYS 
I 

"Before  the  War" 

ALL  our  lives,  we  have  heard  about  the  times  "before 
the  war,"  and  this  is  a  familiar  phrase  among  our 
people.  "The  war"  is  an  era  with  us  of  the  South- 
ern states.  Our  fathers  and  grandfathers  have  told 
us,  around  the  old  fireside,  of  the  good  days  they  saw  be- 
fore the  terrible  clash  between  the  sections.  "Before  the 
war,"  "during  the  war,"  "since  the  war" — all  are  house- 
hold expressions  south  of  the  Potomac.  Not  even  the  war 
with  Spain  has  robbed  us  of  these  phrases;  the  war  of  the 
'6o's  is  still  "the  war"  among  our  people. 

"Before  the  war" — that  was  a  joyous  era  with  our  be- 
loved people.  Not  altogether  blissful,  to  be  sure, — for  life 
is  never  that — but  bright,  happy,  and  hopeful.  Of  course 
our  fathers  had  their  troubles  and  disappointments;  life, 
even  then,  had  its  sunshine  and  its  shadows ;  but  their  sun- 
shine was  brighter  than  ours,  and  the  day  was  longer. 

They  had  a  beautiful  old  civilization,  and  their  homes 
were  refined  and  comfortable,  many  of  them  elegant;  while 

15 


16  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

friends  true  as  steel  thronged  around  them,  ready  to  enjoy 
their  boundless  hospitality  and  to  return  it  on  a  lavish  and 
open-handed  scale. 

In  political  affairs,  the  South  was  vastly  better  off  than 
it  is  to-day,  far  happier  in  the  Union,  not  only  recognized, 
but  trusted  with  leadership  for  several  decades.  Her  states- 
men had  a  prominent  part  in  the  conduct  of  the  govern- 
ment, more  than  three-fourths  of  the  presidents  before  1860 
being  men  of  Southern  birth  or  of  Southern  antecedents. 

Opportunities  being  given,  the  South  gave  the  Union 
many  of  its  greatest  soldiers.  Still  others  were  sprung  from 
families  that  had  recently  migrated  from  her  borders  to 
found  new  commonwealths  beyond  the  Ohio.  Immediately 
you  think  of  George  Washington,  Francis  Marion,  Light 
Horse  Harry  Lee,  Daniel  Morgan,  William  Henry  Har- 
rison, Zachary  Taylor,  and  Andrew  Jackson,  whose  names 
will  be  ever  famous  in  the  military  annals  of  our  earlier 
periods. 

"Before  the  war,"  no  impassable  gulf  yawned  between 
North  and  South.  Of  course  there  was  some  unpleasant- 
ness; indeed,  at  times,  some  bitterness.  Various  questions 
arose,  and  some  of  them  made  New  England  threaten  at 
times  to  leave  the  Union,  so  as  to  get  away  from  her  South- 
ern sisters.  This,  however,  generally  "blew  over,"  as  we  say, 
and  did  not  keep  Southern  men  from  being  called  to  high 
and  honorable  places  in  the  government.  How  is  it  now  in 
this  so-called  "era  of  good  feeling"  ?  What  high  and  honor- 
able places  does  any  president  give  your  father  or  any  of 
your  relatives  ?  What  Southern  gentlemen  are  sent  to  repre- 
sent the  United  States  at  the  courts  of  any  great  European 


101 IX  MARSHALL 


THE  SOUTH  IN  OLDEN  DATS  17 

nation?  How  many  Southern  vice-presidents  have  been 
elected  in  your  day?  What  party  in  your  state  wishes  to 
push  some  eminent  man  of  your  state  for  the  presidency,  and 
thus  blight  his  political  career  forever  ? 

Why  is  this?  Why  is  the  South  thus  isolated,  cut  off 
from  the  rest  of  the  Union?  Why  this  "Solid  South"  that 
you  read  about  so  often  in  the  newspapers  ?  It  is  on  account 
of  "the  war"  and  of  the  problems  that  have  resulted  from  it. 
The  causes  of  this  war  and  the  nature  of  some  of  these 
problems  we  shall  talk  over  in  the  following  pages.  We  re- 
gret that  such  talks  are  necessary.  We  regret  that,  after 
forty  years  of  peace,  the  South's  side  is  so  generally  mis- 
understood, is  so  inadequately  treated  in  many  books  and 
in  the  schoolroom.  Whatever  the  reasons  for  this,  it  is  high 
time  for  Southern  teachers  to  be  up  and  doing.  The  youth 
of  the  South  must  be  told  the  true  story  of  Southern  her- 
oism, of  Southern  genius,  of  Southern  fortitude,  and  must 
be  taught,  clearly  and  fully,  why  the  South  left  the  Union 
that  she  did  so  much  to  create  and  to  make  illustrious. 

II 

No  "Solid  South" 

"The  Solid  South"  is  a  phrase  born  within  recent  years. 
It  is  the  child  of  war  and  bitterness.  We  love  to  think  of 
the  days  when  there  was  no  such  phrase  in  our  language  and 
no  such  fact  in  our  history.  Local  jealousies  and  sectional 
animosities  have,  of  course,  existed  from  the  earliest  periods 
of  our  history,  but  they  were  not  bounded  by  the  Potomac 
2 


18  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

river.  No  surveyor's  line,  no  river,  separated  two  great  un- 
friendly sections  of  our  country;  that  is  comparatively  re- 
cent. The  North  voted  enthusiastically  for  numerous 
Southern  presidents.  The  North  called  Washington  twice 
to  the  head  of  the  American  army  and  twice  to  the  presi- 
dential office.  She  called  Marshall  to  the  Supreme  Bench, 
and  has  put  him  among  her  idols.  More  recent  alienation 
between  the  sections  is  unnatural  and  unnecessary.  If  Vir- 
ginia and  New  England  disliked  each  other  during  the  early 
days  of  our  history,  so  did  New  York  and  New  England ; 
Connecticut  and  Pennsylvania.  To-day,  however,  the 
South  is  in  many  respects  almost  cut  off  from  the  Union, 
almost  as  little  connected  with  the  Federal  government  as 
Korea  or  Madagascar. 

Not  so  was  it  in  the  revolutionary  and  ante-bellum  eras. 
Did  Adams  and  Ellery  and  Roger  Sherman  and  Rush  and 
Franklin  go  off  in  a  corner  and  act  without  the  advice  of 
the  Southern  delegates  ?  The  answer  rises  to  your  lips : 
"No;  they  worked  hand  in  hand  with  the  great  patriots  of 
the  South,  and  wrote  their  names  alongside  those  of  Carroll, 
Wythe,  the  Lees,  Jefferson,  Rutledge,  Middleton,  John 
Penn,  George  Walton,  and  other  men  whose  fame  can  never 
perish." 

Who  was  called  to  lead  the  armies  of  the  young  nation 
in  its  fight  for  independence?  Did  sectionalism  place  the 
sword  in  weak  and  impotent  hands?  No,  those  were  better 
days  than  ours;  for  we  have  seen  a  Fitzhugh  Lee,  gallant 
chevalier  and  statesman,  left  to  play  soldier,  clean  camps, 
administer  capsules,  in  the  swamps  of  Florida,  when  he 
should  have  been  leading  the  armies  of  his  country  to  the 


THE  SOUTH  IN  OLDEN  DAYS  19 

walls  of  Havana.  We  have  seen  the  same  distinguished  man 
assigned  an  insignificant  part  in  the  government  of  Cuba 
after  that  island  came  under  the  care  of  the  United  States. 
Our  forefathers,  however,  saw  a  better  sight.  They  saw 
John  Adams,  of  Massachusetts,  urge  George  Washington,  of 
Virginia,  as  commander-in-chief  of  the  American  army,  and 
saw  a  throng  of  New  England  people  shout  applause,  as  the 
great  son  of  Virginia  accepted  his  sword  under  the  Cam- 
bridge elm,  on  the  soil  of  Massachusetts.  They  saw  such 
great  Northern  soldiers  as  Anthony  Wayne  and  Nathaniel 
Greene  follow -the  Virginian  to  victory  under  the  same  ban- 
ner as  Marion,  Sumter,  and  Pickens  of  South  Carolina; 
"Light  Horse  Harry"  Lee,  Hugh  Mercer,  Andrew  Lewis, 
and  Daniel  Morgan,  of  Virginia;  Francis  Nash  and  Wil- 
liam R.  Da  vie,  of  North  Carolina;  Joseph  Habersham,  of 
Georgia;  John  Sevier  and  Isaac  Shelby,  heroes  of  the  fron- 
tier. 

"Give  us  back  the  ties  of  York  town! 

Perish  all  the  modern  hates! 
Let  us  stand  together,  brothers, 

In  defiance  of  the  Fates; 
For  the  safety  of  the  Union 

Is  the  aafety  of  the  States  !  "  * 

III 

44 There  Is  Glory  Enough  for  Us  All" 

In  drafting  the  constitution,  also,  men  of  the  North  and 
of  the  South  stood  shoulder  to  shoulder.    Just  as  they 


*James  Barren  Hope,  Yorktown  Centennial  poem. 


20  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

risked  their  "lives,"  their  "fortunes,"  and  their  "sacred 
honor"  together,  so  they  sent  their  greatest  men  to  consult 
together  as  to  the  kind  of  government  they  should  form  for 
themselves  and  their  posterity. 

Of  the  details  of  the  constitution  of  1787,  we  shall  speak 
more  fully  in  a  later  section  of  this  chapter.  Here  we  may 
pause  for  a  few  remarks  by  way  of  introduction.  A  South- 
ern state,  Virginia,  led  the  way  in  calling  for  a  convention 
to  frame  a  constitution  for  the  thirteen  free  and  independ- 
ent states.  It  was  Madison  and  Washington,  of  Virginia, 
who  saw  more  clearly  than  almost  any  other  men  north  or 
south  that  the  young  nation  just  cut  loose  from  England 
needed  a  strong  government  to  keep  it  from  falling  to 
pieces  at  home  and  from  being  despised  abroad.  Along 
with  these  patriots,  we  should  mention  Alexander  Hamilton, 
the  brilliant  statesman  of  New  York,  and  both  Madison  and 
Hamilton  are  often  spoken  of  as  "the  fathers  of  the  con- 
stitution." Another  great  man  of  that  era  was  John  Jay, 
afterwards  chief-justice.  When  we  think  of  the  constitu- 
tion, we  cannot  fail  to  think  of  Washington,  whose  personal 
influence  alone  induced  many  men  to  vote  for  the  great  paper 
that  was  ready  in  September,  1787,  to  be  submitted  to  Con- 
gress and  to  the  several  states  for  adoption.  In  all  these 
details,  we  see  clearly  that  the  great  men  of  all  sections 
worked  hand  in  hand  for  the  general  welfare.  Neither  sec- 
tion can  claim  all  the  glory;  the  "honors  are  even." 

In  the  foregoing  sentences,  we  have  seen  in  generous 
emulation  men  from  both  sides  of  the  Potomac.  Again,  in 
the  convention  that  drafted  the  constitution,  we  find,  be- 
sides several  already  mentioned,  Ruf us  King,  of  Massachu- 


THE  SOUTH  IN  OLDEN  DAYS  21 

setts;  Benjamin  Franklin,  James  Wilson,  Robert  Morris, 
and  Gouverneur  Morris,  of  Pennsylvania;  John  Dickinson, 
of  Delaware ;  and  Roger  Sherman,  of  Connecticut,  standing 
shoulder  to  shoulder  with  Daniel  Carroll,  of  Maryland ;  Ed- 
mund Randolph  and  George  Mason,  of  Virginia;  Hugh 
Williamson  and  William  R.  Davie,  of  North  Carolina; 
Abraham  Baldwin  and  William  Few,  of  Georgia ;  John  Rut- 
ledge,  Charles  and  Cotes  worth  Pinckney,  of  South  Carolina. 

IV 

Roanoke  Island,  St.  Augustine,  and  Jamestown 

A  great  poet  tells  us,  "The  poetry  of  earth  is  never  dead." 
This  means  that  the  poetical  in  life,  in  the  universe,  appeals 
incessantly  to  humanity,  and  that,  as  long  as  man  has  sor- 
rows to  bemoan  and  joys  to  cheer  him,  the  poet  will  be 
needed  to  inspire  and  console  him. 

Not  all  poetry  is  written  in  words,  and  clothed  in  rhyth- 
mical language.  If  there  are,  as  Shakespeare  says,  "ser- 
mons in  stones,"  there  are  also  poems  in  places,  in  great 
events,  and  in  the  great  ideas  that  thrill  mankind.  There 
is  something  thrilling,  something  too  deep  for  utterance, 
welling  up  within  us  as  we  look  at  the  "old  gateway"  and 
the  "ivy-mantled  tower,"  coming  down  to  us  as  relics  of 
antiquity.  He  who  has  no  such  poetry  in  his  soul,  though 
he  may  not  be  quite  "fit  for  treasons,  stratagems,  and 
spoils,"  lacks  that  imagination  which  givt  -  to  life  and  to 
travel  "the  glory  and  the  freshness  of  a  dream." 

With  romance  and  poetry,  our  Southern  past  is  glorious. 


22  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

Carolina  has  her  Roanoke  Island,  associated  with  the  name 
of  Walter  Raleigh,  whose  whole  career  is  wrapped  in  ro- 
mantic glamour.  It  is  the  glory  of  the  South  that  this  great 
chevalier  and  soldier  stands  in  the  forefront  of  her  history. 

Of  Roanoke  Island  you  have  read  in  your  histories.  Here 
was  made  the  first  English  settlement  in  the  New  World; 
and  "the  lost  colony  of  Roanoke"  is  the  most  pathetic  ro- 
mance in  our  history.  The  word  Croatan  carved  upon  that 
tree  will  be  the  sad  enigma  of  the  centuries;  and  myriads 
of  children  yet  unborn  will  wonder  whether  the  settlers  were 
murdered  by  the  savages,  died  of  starvation,  or  perchance 
were  adopted  into  some  tribe  of  Indians. 

Another  sacred  shrine  is  St.  Augustine,  Florida.  All 
Americans  love  to  visit  the  old  town  and  look  at  its  ancient 
gateway.  It  was  on  this  spot  that  the  white  man  made  his 
first  permanent  settlement  in  America,  and,  though  the  re- 
lations between  the  Spaniards,  whose  ancestors  planted  this 
town,  and  the  race  to  which  we  belong  have  not  always  been 
pleasant,  we  feel  a  solemn  thrill  as  we  think  of  the  time 
when  the  great  white  race  to  which  we  both  belong  first 
planted  a  home  on  this  mighty  continent. 

Still  dearer  to  us  of  English  blood  are  the  ruins  of  James- 
town. The  feelings  that  stir  our  hearts  as  we  stand  under 
the  shadow  of  the  old  tower  are  too  deep  for  utterance,  and 
we  almost  beg  to  be  left  alone  with  our  awe  and  our  solemn 
meditation. 

Whence  those  deep  feelings,  those  unutterable  emotions? 
It  is  the  reverence  for  antiquity,  the  lofty  sentiment  that 
raises  us  above  the  brute  creation.  Misers  are  not  without 
it;  hard-hearted  lovers  of  the  "almighty  dollar"  cannot  re- 


THE  SOUTH  IN  OLDEN  DAYS  23 

sist  it ;  and  hundreds,  if  not  thousands,  of  the  richest  in  our 
land  visit  that  spot  every  year,  tread  reverently  its  sacred 
sward,  read  the  inscriptions  upon  its  old  tombstones,  and 
hear  in  imagination  the  echoes  of  the  old  bell  that  used  to 
call  the  fathers  of  America  to  the  house  of  worship. 

Dear  to  every  American  should  be  that  now  deserted 
island.  Proud  should  Virginians  be  that  they  are  cus- 
todians of  that  shrine  with  its  sacred  memories;  for  it  was 
on  that  spot,  on  the  I3th  of  May,  1607,  that  the  first  per- 
manent English  settlement  in  America  was  made.  There 
the  first  English  home  in  America  was  established;  there 
Reverend  Robert  Hunt,  the  first  English  minister  in  Amer- 
ica, read  the  new  liturgy  of  the  reformed  Church  of  Eng- 
land, and  under  a  spreading  canvas,  with  the  green  sward  of 
nature  as  his  carpet,  "sang  the  Lord's  song  in  a  strange 
land."  Its  tower  no  longer  rings  with  the  reverberating 
peals  of  holy  bells,  calling  to  meditation  and  to  prayer. 
Only  the  dead  are  there.  All  is  in  ruins.  Yet  we  feel,  as 
we  stand  in  those  sacred  precincts,  that  the  poet*  was  right 
when  he  said, 

"Yes,  give  me  a  land  that  has  legends  and  lays." 

What  other  section  has  a  Pocahontas?  Others  here 
and. there  have  a  kind  Indian  woman  shielding  the  whites 
from  treachery  and  cruelty;  but  Pocahontas,  "the  Princess 
of  the  Forest,"  the  daughter  of  kings,  the  mother  of  states- 
men that  have  been  and  that  are  to  be — she  will  ever  stand 
alone,  unique,  on  the  canvas  of  history,  inspiring  the  artist's 
brush,  the  historian's  pen,  and  the  poet's  lyre. 

*Father  Ryan. 


24  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

The  saving  of  John  Smith  by  Pocahontas  may  some  day 
be  proved  a  myth  by  historians.  With  the  people,  however, 
the  great  masses,  who  love  everything  romantic  and  poetic, 
Pocahontas  will  forever  bend  over  Smith,  between  him  and 
the  club  of  the  cruel  Indian,  and  save  him  from  the  bloody 
death  that  hangs  over  him.  Maidens,  too,  will  ever  sigh 
over  the  love  affairs  of  Pocahontas,  and  drop  a  tear  of  sym- 
pathy. They  will  think  how  cruel  it  was  that  she  should  be 
told  that  Smith  had  died  in  England  and  that,  believing  this, 
she  had  listened  to  the  wooings  of  Rolfe,  while  her  own 
"dear  Captain"  was  thinking  of  her  in  England  far  away. 

Why  is  the  year  1619  immortal  in  our  annals  and  why  is 
the  date  July  30,  1619,  mentioned  with  rapture  and  with  rev- 
erence by  our  historians?  The  same  lofty  sentiment  ex- 
plains it.  It  is  the  inborn  respect  for  antiquity,  the  reverence 
for  what  is  venerable  in  our  history.  Because  in  that  year 
and  on  that  day,  there  met,  in  the  church  at  Jamestown,  the 
first  American  Congress,  the  first  body  of  lawmakers  that 
ever  came  together  on  this  continent,  and  there  and  then 
the  twenty-two  burgesses,  or  representatives,  of  Virginia, 
with  an  independence  and  an  earnestness  never  surpassed 
and  rarely  equalled,  discussed  some  of  the  most  important 
questions  that  ever  engaged  the  attention  of  a  legislative 
assembly  of  any  people. 

Possibly,  "state  pride"  might  lead  the  present  writer  to 
exaggerate  the  importance  of  this  great  assembly :  let  us 
hear  what  John  Fiske,  of  Massachusetts,  says  of  the  charter 
under  which  this  assembly  met:  "The  Magna  Charta  of 

Virginia hardly  second  to  any  other 

state  paper  of  the  I7th  century."  This  is  from  a  Northern 


THE  SOUTH  IN  OLDEN  DAYS  25 

historian,  fair  to  the  South  generally,  but  not  especially 
anxious  to  glorify  any  section  other  than  New  England. 
John  Esten  Cooke,  the  Virginian,  says  of  this  same  assem- 
bly, "The  event  was  a  portentous  one.  The  old  world  had 
passed  away,  and  the  new  was  born." 

And  these  first  American  lawmakers  were  worthy  of  the 
day.  They  took  up  the  greatest  subjects  that  ever  engaged 
the  attention  of  a  legislative  body.  They  passed  on  the 
rights  of  certain  men  to  seats  in  the  assembly,  that  is,  on  the 
eligibility  of  some  of  their  own  members ;  discussed  the  dan- 
gers arising  from  cruel  Indian  neighbors ;  discussed  agricul- 
ture, their  main  source  of  support;  made  laws  in  regard  to 
the  church,  which  was  then  an  established  or  state  church; 
and  took  steps  to  found  a  college  for  the  education  of  their 
sons,  thus  making  the  South  the  pioneer  in  the  higher  edu- 
cation of  America.* 

This  same  assembly  petitioned  the  London  Company  at 
home  to  grant  them  authority  "to  allow  or  disallow  of  their 
orders  of  court,  as  his  Majesty  hath  given  them  power  to 
allow  or  disallow  our  laws."  This  is  the  claim  of  local  self- 
government.  It  sounds  the  first  note  of  the  great  contention 
between  local  self-government  and  outside  interference,  the 
contention  which  fired  the  eloquence  of  Patrick  Henry  in 
1765,  flashed  from  the  sword  of  Washington  ten  years  later, 
and  nerved  the  arm  of  Lee  and  his  heroes  in  the  great  war 
for  Southern  independence. 

Two  years  later,  another  great  idea  was  planted  in  Vir- 
ginia. Sir  Francis  Wyatt  was  sent  from  England  as  gover- 

*In  this  connection  we  may  state  that  the  first  female  college  in  the  world  was  estab- 
lished in  Macon,  Georgia. 


26  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

nor,  and  brought  with  him  a  "formal  grant  of  free  govern- 
ment by  written  charter,"  "the  first  charter  of  free  govern- 
ment in  America"  (1621). 

The  South,  then,  was  the  cradle  of  American  civilization. 
If  Thanet  is  dear  to  all  Englishmen  as  the  place  where  their 
fathers  first  set  foot  upon  the  soil  of  England,  if  Athens  is 
proud  of  her  Acropolis  and  loves  every  foot  of  its  great 
rock,  every  American  must  feel  a  thrill  of  awe  and  of  sa- 
cred rapture,  as  he  treads  the  verdant  sward  of  Jamestown 
and  thinks  of  the  day  when  the  Susan  Constant,  the  God- 
speed, and  the  Discovery  cast  anchor  off  that  green  penin- 
sula, and  the  great  Anglo-Saxon  race  planted  its  first  home 
on  the  new  continent. 

In  concluding  this  chapter,  let  us  go  back  for  a  moment 
to  our  text  which  is  taken  from  the  verses  of  a  great  poet 
who  said  that  his  name  was  "writ  in  water,"  but  who,  be- 
cause he  believed  that  the  poetry  of  earth  was  never  dead 
and  has.  taught  others  to  believe  it,  is  now  numbered  among 
the  immortals.  Yes,  in  this  practical,  money-loving  age,  we 
need  more  than  one  Keats  to  help  us  "hitch  our  wagon  to 
a  star." 

However,  there  are  still  many  that  feel  the  poetry  of 
earth.  Even  wealthy  stockbrokers  and  porkpackers  some- 
times find  poems  in  places.  Some  would  buy  the  shrines  of 
the  South  and  ship  them  to  Chicago.  Shall  we  sell  the  tower 
of  Jamestown?  Shall  a  syndicate  have  it  and  move  it  to 
Cincinnati  ?  What  rich  young  university  shall  buy  the  poet- 
ry and ,  the  glory  of  old  William  and  Mary  College? 
When  shall  we  auction  off  the  old  gateway  at  St.  Augustine  ? 
Would  Carolina  sell  King's  Mountain  for  its  weight  in  gold 


THE  SOUTH  IN  OLDEN  DATS  27 

and  silver?  Shall  the  tomb  of  Washington  be  moved  from 
Mount  Vernon  to  some  Northern  city  where  more  may  visit 
it? 

"There  is  grandeur  in  graves,  there  is  glory  in  gloom," 

sings  one  of  our  heartbroken  poets  ;*  and  he  knew  it  all  by 
experience.  He  sang  out  of  a  full  heart.  He  had  stood  by 
the  ruins  and  had  sat  by  the  graves.  He  tells  us,  in  his  own 
language,  what  Keats  had  already  sung,  that  "the  poetry  of 
earth  is  ceasing  never;"  but  that,  as  with  other  forms  of 
beauty,  "its  loveliness  increases,  it  will  never  pass  into  noth- 
ingness." 

V 

"Sic  Semper  Tyrannis" 
(i>  HARVEY  AND  BERKELEY 

In  resisting  tyranny,  also,  the  South  may  claim  priority. 
Her  sons  have  always  loved  freedom  and  hated  tyrants. 

In  the  histories  of  Virginia,  you  have  read  a  good  deal 
about  "the  thrusting  out  of  Sir  John  Harvey."  This  was, 
we  may  say,  a  "bloodless  revolution." 

Harvey  was  the  governor  of  Virginia,  sent  out  (1629) 
by. Charles  I,  king  of  England,  and  was  a  worthy  disciple 
of  his  tyrannical  master.  Besides  being  a  tyrant,  Harvey 
was  unprincipled  in  money  matters,  "robbing  the  treasury 
and  trying  to  sell  lands  belonging  to  individuals."  The  Vir- 
ginians.  called  an  Assembly  "to  hear  complaints  against  the 

•Father  Ryan. 


28  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

Governor;"  and  "On  the  28th  of  April,  1635,"  as  the  old 
record  quaintly  puts  it,  "Sir  John  Harvey ,  thrust  out  of  his 
government,  and  Capt.  John  West  acts  as  Governor  till  the 
King's  pleasure  known."  After  a  short  contest  with  the 
people  of  A  irginia,  Charles  yielded,  and  Harvey  vanished 
into  nothingness. 

About  forty. years  later,  the  Virginians  again  rose  up  in 
rebellion.  This  time,  they  were  armed,  and  ready  to  play 
sic  semper  tyrannis  with  an  orchestra  of  gun  and  cannon. 
We  refer  of  course  to  Bacon's  Rebellion. 

For, many  years,  the  Virginians  and  the  New  England 
colonists  had  had  grievances  against  England.  The  Navi- 
gation Acts,  first  passed  in  1651,  were  pressing  hard  upon  all 
the  colonies,  compelling  them  to  ship  their  tobacco,  and  other 
produce  to  England  in  English  ships,  prohibiting  them  from 
purchasing  manufactured  goods  from  any  country  but  Eng- 
land, and  from  trading  with  each  other  in  any  article  of 
importance.  This  meant  ruin  and  starvation  to  our  colonial 
fathers. 

In  1673  came  something  still  more  galling.  In  this  year, 
"the  merry  monarch,"  Charles  II,  to  reward  two  of  his 
favorites  for  their  valuable  services — probably  for  telling 
smutty  jokes  well  or  for  inventing  new  pleasures — granted 
them  "that  entire  tract  of  land  and  .water  commonly  called 
Virginia,"  to  have  and  to  hold  for  thirty-one  years.  This 
was  practical  confiscation. 

In  1676,  came  the  straw  that  broke  the  camel's  back.  The 
once-popular  and  beloved  governor,  Sir  William  Berkeley, 
had  grown  peevish  and  tyrannical  in, his  old  age,  and  was 
afraid  to  give  arms  to  the  Virginians,  for  fear  they  might 


THE  SOUTH  IN  OLDEN  DAYS  29 

use  them  against  'him  and  his  royal  master.  When  the  In- 
dians rose  up  in  1676,  Berkeley  refused  to  grant  a  com- 
mission to  a  brave  and  eloquen4:  young  planter  who  wished 
to  lead  his  people  against  the  Indians.  After  parleyings  and 
wranglings  between  the  followers  of  Berkeley  and  of  the 
young  planter,  Nathaniel  Bacon,  civil  war  broke  out,  and 
hundreds  of  men  fought  on  each  side.  Suddenly  Bacon  died 
of  a  fever,  and  the  "rebellion"  ended.  His  grave  is  un- 
known to  this  day.  He  was  buried  secretly,  so  that  Berke- 
ley might  not  "hang,  draw,  and  quarter"  the  dead  rebel,  as 
he  no  doubt  intended  to  do. 

History  settles  accounts  strictly  with  men  like  Berkeley. 
They  go  down  to  oblivion  "unwept,  unhonored,  and  un- 
sung." So  with  the  once-honored  and  courted  vice-regal 
governor  of  Virginia.  His  name  is  rarely  mentioned  save  in 
scorn  or  in  contemptuous  pity.  At  his  home  near  Williams- 
burg,  no  traveler  drops  the  tear  of  love  or  heaves  the  sigh 
of  admiration.  Bacon,  on  the  contrary,  is  honored  in  Amer- 
ica. Northern  and  Southern  writers  unite  in  singing  his 
praises.  Monuments  are  even  now  going  up  to  perpetuate 
his  memory;  and,  by  a  strange  freak  of  fortune,  his  name 
has  been  given  ,  to  the  post-office  recently  established  at 
Greenspring,  the  old  home  of  Berkeley. 

Bacon,  then,  is  the  first  American .  rebel  against  armed 
tyranny.  His  faithful  lieutenant,  Thomas  Hansford,  is  the 
first  American  martyr  to  liberty.  Well  may  Virginia  cher- 
ish the  memory  of  such  sons !  Well  has  she  earned  the  right 
to  blazon  sic  semper  tyrannis  upon  her  scutcheon, — that 
motto  under  which  her  sons  have  fought  under  rebels  whose 
fame  grows  brighter  with  the  ages. 


30  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

If  Virginia  had  her  Harvey  and  her  Berkeley,  New  Eng- 
land had  her  Andros,  and  North  Carolina  her  Tryon.  Only 
in  the  matter  of  priority  did  Virginia  have  the  advantage  of 
her  sister  colonies;  for  it  was  not  till  1691  that  the  people 
of  Boston  rose  up  against  Andros,  "the  tyrant  of  New  Eng- 
land," and  shipped  him  back  to  old  England ;  ^and,  in  1771, 
some  of  the  brave  men  of  the  "Old  North  State"  rose  up 
against  the  infamous  Tryon  and  fought  against  him  at  the 
river  Alamance. 

Probably  no  one  ( thing  did  more  to  bring  on  the  Revolu- 
tionary movement  than  the  conduct  of  several  of  these  royal 
governors  like  Andros,  Tryon,  and  Dunmore.  In  selecting 
such  men,  England  showed  herself  perversely  blind  to  her 
own  interests  and  indifferent  to  those  of  her  colonies.  It 
would  seem  that  America  had  to  be  free,  and  that  "offenses 
must  needs  come;"  but  t  "woe  to  him  by  whom  the  offense 
cometh." 


(a)  "TAXATION  WITHOUT  REPRESENTATION" 

In  judging  England  for  her  treatment  of  our  colonial 
ancestors,  we  must  remember  that  she  was  no  worse  than 
other  nations.  The  relation  between  colonies  and  the 
mother  country  is  far  more  pleasant  now  than  in  earlier 
periods  of  modern  history.  In  the  eighteenth  century,  colo- 
nies were  supposed  to  exist  entirely  for  the  benefit  of  the 
mother  country;  the  idea  of  mutual  benefit  was  hardly 
dreamed  of  except  by  a  few  statesmen,  who  were  regarded 
as  political  dreamers. 


THE  SOUTH  IN  OLDEN  DATS  31 

These  facts  will  help  us  to  understand  why  the  English 
parliament  frequently  reenacted  the  Navigation  Laws,  and 
made  them  harsh  and  galling.  This  of  course  produced  hard 
feeling  against  the  mother  country.  Moreover,  our  ances- 
tors resorted  to  all  kinds  of  means  to  evade  the  Navigation 
Laws;  and  thus  many  of  our  people  got  into  the  bad  habit 
of  taking  the  law  in  their  own  hands — which,  if  not  checked, 
will  ( undermine  the  foundations  of  government,  and  ruin 
any  race  or  nation. 

English  people  often  say  that  American  children  are 
taught  to  hate  England.  If  so,  it  is  the  fault  of  the  books 
and  the  teachers.  Whatever  indignation  we  may  justly  feel 
should  be  directed  rather  against  George  III  and  his  advis- 
ers, his  ministers,  as  we  call  them.  Even  then,  however,  we 
should  remember  that  George  had  a  constitutional  tendency 
towards  insanity,  and  that  he  was  not  always  responsible. 
Moreover,  hefchad  bad  advice,  bad  teachecs,  from  his  very 
boyhood.  His  mother,  for  instance,  was  a  highstrung  wom- 
an, and  brought  him  up  with  the  idea  that  he  must  "be 
king;"  and  in  1760,  at  the  age  of  twenty-five,  he  tried  to 
rule  according  to  the  methods  of  the  Stuarts,  one, of  whom 
had  been  beheaded  (1649),  and  another  driven  into  exile 
(1685). 

In  studying  about  the  American  Revolution,  furthermore, 
we  should  know  something  about  the  parliaments  of  that 
period.  In  our  day,  parliament  is  a  representative  body. 
It  is  elected  by  the  great  mass  of  English  male  citizens.  It 
knows  the  wishes  of  the  people,  and  is  governed  by  public 
opinion.  In  George's  day,. a  handful  of  freeholders  elected 
members  of  parliament.  Prominent  landholders  gave  away 


32  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

seats,  and  left  them  in  their  wills  to  their  sons  and  others. 
You  can  see,  then,  that  England  was  an  oligarchy,  and  that 
the  masses  had  little  voice  in  the  government. 

The  king,  too,  had  far  more  power  than  at  present.  His 
personal  sovereignty  was  vastly  greater.  He  could  intimi- 
date parliament  and  browbeat  his  cabinet,  both  of  which 
things  George  did  habitually. 

In  spite  of  all  that  we  vhave  said,  however,  the  English 
people  must  bear  a  part  of  the  blame.  They  fired  up  angrily 
when  they  heard  that  America  was  defying  England.  They 
thought  they  ought  to  stand  by  the  government,  just  as 
many  of  us  Americans  think  in  regard  to  matters  of  our  day. 
"My  country,  may  she  ever  be  right,  but  right  or  wrong, 
my  country" — this  is  the  feeling  of  a  great  number  of  pa- 
triotic men  in  all  ages. 

"Taxation  •without  representation"  was  a  popular  politi- 
cal phrase  of  the  pre-revolutionary  era.  Used  by  the  elo- 
quent James  Otis,  of  Massachusetts,  it  spread  throughout 
the  colonies.  It  was  a  popular  but  vague  phrase.  Its  real 
meaning  depends  upon  the  meaning  of  "representation." 
Many  Englishmen  said  that  the  Americans  had  as  much 
representation  as  a  large  number  of  people  in  England. 
Some  in  'both  countries  thought  that  America ,  should  have 
actual  representatives  in  parliament;  but  many  others 
thought  that  this  was  impracticable.  What  the  colonists 
really  wanted  was  taxation  by  their  local  assemblies;  and 
this  was  what  George  III  vehemently  refused  them.  So 
the  long  quarrel  continued.  "The  irrepressible  conflict"  be- 
tween the  mother  and  the  daughter  ^was  drawing  nearer. 
The  bitterness  engendered  in  those  days  and  in  a  later  pe- 


PATRICK  HENRY 


THE  SOUTH  IN  OLDEN  DAYB  33 

riod  is  gradually  passing  away;  and  it  is  to  be  hoped  that 
the  present  century  will  see  the  two  great  Anglo-Saxon  na- 
tions bound  by  indissoluble  ties  of  love  and  amity. 

(b)  "  TREASON  1    TREASON  I" 

Two  years  after  James  Otis,  another  great  orator  of  revo- 
lution stepped  into  the  arena.  This  was  Patrick  Henry, 
the  "tongue  of  the  Revolution."  In  1763,  he  made 
his  famous  speech  in  the  "Parsons'  Cause"  at  Hanover 
Courthouse,  Virginia,  voicing  the  pent-up  feelings  of  his 
countrymen  against  George  III  and  his  advisers. 

In  1758,  the  tobacco  crop  having  failed,  the  Burgesses 
had  enacted  that  all  debts  payable  in  tobacco,  then  a  species 
of  currency,  might  be  paid  in  .money  at  the  rate  of  two 
pence  a  pound.  In  1763,  tobacco  being  very  scarce  and  very 
high,  some  of  the  vestries,  in  settling  with  the  parsons,  fell 
back  upon  this  "Two-Penny  Act,"  though  it  was  virtually 
repudiating  two-thirds  of  the  salary  of  the  minister.  The 
matter  might  have  been  settled  peaceably  between  the  clergy 
and  their  people  if  the  king  had  not  meddled,  in  order  to 
use  his  "prerogative,"  as  he  called  it.  In  the  suit  of  the  Rev. 
James  Maury  against  his  vestry,  the  latter  engaged  Patrick 
Henry,  an  awkward  and  ungainly-looking  young  lawyer, 
to  protect  their  interests.  He  criticized  the  clergy  so  bitterly 
that  those  present  left  the  courthouse  in  mingled  fury  and 
dismay.  He  launched  such  thunderbolts  of  wrath  at 
George  III,  that  the  leading  counsel  for  Mr.  Maury  said  to 
the  court  that  he  wondered  how  the  justices  could  tolerate 
3 


34  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

such  treasonable  language.  The  jury  gave  the  parson  one 
cent  damages  instead  of  several  hundred  dollars.  It  was 
really  a  verdict  against  the  king  for  interference. 

This  trial  has  become  famous  in  history.  It  was  really 
the, case  of  the  people  of  Virginia  against  George  III,  and 
"the  first  formal  defiance"  hurled  by  America  at  England, 
savs  Fiske,  the  Massachusetts  historian. 

Two  years  later  still,  came  the  Stamp  Act  (1765).  Of 
Henry's  speech  in  Williamsburg,  we  need  not  speak  in  detail 
in  this  volume ;  it  is  described  in  all  your  histories.  To  pay 
a  stamp  tax  on  all  legal  papers,  contracts,  wills,  newspapers, 
lawyers'  licenses,  pamphlets,  and  various  other  written  and 
printed  matter,  was  annoying  and  burdensome ;  but  the  main 
thing,  as  already  intimated,  was  the  principle.  Our  fathers 
were  willing  to  be  taxed  by  their  own  assemblies,  but  not  by 
a  parliament  across  the  ocean.  When  the  blood  is  hot,  rea- 
son becomes  clouded.  Soon  the  phrase  "no  taxation  with- 
out representation"  became  "no  legislation  without  repre- 
sentation"— which  meant  of  course  that  the  colonists  would 
shake  off  allegiance  to  England,  if  the  men  using  that  phrase 
should  take  the  leadership. 

Henry's  speech  on  the  Five  Resolutions  made  an  epoch. 
"Virginia  rang  the  alarm  bell,"  says  a  Northern  writer. 
"Virginia  gave  the  signal  to  the  continent,"  wrote  Gen- 
eral Gage,  the  British  commander.  Virginia,  however, 
was  divided;  on  one  side  were  the  "big  wigs"  and  aristoc- 
racy; on  the  other,  the  yeomanry,  led  by  Patrick  Henry. 
The  vote  was  very  close;  and  the  morning  after  the  House 
of  Burgesses  voted  and  adjourned,  one  of  the  boldest  reso- 


THE  SOUTH  IN  OLDEN  DAYS  35 


lutions  was  found  to  have  been  torn  from  the  secretary's 
record. 

All  students  of  history  have  doubtless  heard  of  Peyton 
Randolph.  He  was  a  member  of  the  House  of  Burgesses, 
and  rushed  out  crying,  "I  would  gladly  give  five  hundred 
guineas  for  another  vote."  What  could  he  have  meant? 
Not  that  he  wished  to  buy  a  vote ;  for  that,  though  common 
in  England  at  that  time,  was  not  dreamed  of  in  Virginia. 
He  of  course  meant  that,  if  he  could  honorably  do  so,  he 
would  gladly  pay  this  large  sum  to  vote  twice ;  for,  by  so  do- 
ing, he  would  producei  a  tie,  and  leave  the  decision  to  the 
Speaker,  who  would  vote  against  the  five  resolutions.  Nine 
years  later,  this  same  Peyton  Randolph  was  one  of  the 
leaders  against  George  III  and  his  ministry. 

Virginia  was  the  most, fearless  of  the  colonies.  No  other 
had  taken  so  bold  a  stand  on  the  Stamp  Act.  Some  had 
protested  before  the  act  was  passed;  but,  after  its  passage, 
there  were  no  signs  of  resistance  until  Henry  threw  down 
the  gauntlet.  Even  James  Otis  declared  the  Five  Resolu- 
tions treasonable,  and  said  that  America  must  submit.  The 
action  of  Virginia  gave  new  nerve  and  boldness  to  the  other 
colonies.  Massachusetts  suggested  a  Congress  of  all  the 
colonies.  This  body,  representing  nine  colonies,  met  in  New 
York,  October  7,  1765.  The  most  enthusiastic  response  to 
the  call  came  from  South  Carolina ;  and  one  of  the  leading 
spirits  of  the  Congress  was  her  representative,  Christopher 
Gadsden,  "the  learned  scholar,"  the  "broad-minded  man  of 
rare  sagacity  and  most  liberal  spirit,"  a  man  too  little  no- 
ticed in  American  history,  but  destined  to  shine  brightly 
when  history  is  written  fairly  and  accurately.  Virginia  was 


36  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

not  represented.  Her  House  of  Burgesses  was  prevented 
from  meeting,  being  dissolved  by  the  royal  governor, 
Francis  Fauquier. 

This  Stamp  Act  Congress,  under  the  leadership  of  Liv- 
ingston, of  New  York,  and  Gadsden,  of  South  Carolina, 
adopted  a  series  of  resolutions  echoing  the  spirit  of  those 
offered  by  Henry  in  the  Virginia  legislature,  and  addressed 
memorials  to  the  king  and  to  both  Houses  of  Parliament. 

Nine  years  later  (1774),  came  the  famous  Continental 
Congress,  so  called  to  distinguish  it  from  the  Provincial 
Congress  of  several  colonies.  "The  first  call  came  from  Vir- 
ginia;" the  first  session  of  this  Congress  opened  September 
5,  1774;  and  the  first  president  was  Peyton  Randolph,  of 
Virginia.  The  South  was  nobly  represented  in  these  bodies. 
In  the  first,  sat  John  and  Edward  Rutledge,  of  South  Caro- 
lina; Samuel  Chase,  of  Maryland;  Edmund  Pendleton, 
Richard  Henry  Lee,  Patrick  Henry,  and  George  Washing- 
ton, of  Virginia.  An  eminent  Northern  historian,  in  nam- 
ing the  most  prominent  members,  selects  twelve, — the  above 
seven,  with  five  distinguished  sons  of  New  England,  New 
York,  and  Pennsylvania. 

VI 

Virginia  and  Carolina 

(i)  TEA  PARTIES 

The  Stamp  Act  was  to  go  into  effect  November  i,  1765. 
When  that  day  came,  bells  were  tolled,  business  was  gen- 
erally suspended,  and  flags  were  raised  at  half-mast.  When 


THE  SOUTH  IN  OLDEN  DAYS  37 

the  stamps  arrived,  they  were  seized  and  burned.  The 
stamp  officers  resigned.  Lawyers  agreed  to  consider  un- 
stamped documents  legally  valid.  The  woman  of  the  colo- 
nies wore  homespun  cloth  for  clothing;  English  goods  of,  all 
kinds  were  boycotted  ;  the  whole  continent  had  risen  in  un- 
armed rebellion. 

English  merchants  sent  petitions  for  a  repeal  of  the  Stamp 
Act.  Pitt  and  Burke,  two  great  orators  of  parliament,  op- 
posed the  law  in  the  House  of  Commons.  Pitt  said,  "I  re- 
joice that  America  has  resisted."  On  March  18,  1766,  par- 
liament repealed  the  Stamp  Act,  but  asserted  its  right  to 
"bind  America  in  all  cases  whatsoever."  This  of  course 
stirred  the  colonists  to  fury. 

Shortly  after  this,  an  act  was  passed  forbidding  all  trade 
between  the  colonies  and  certain  West  India  islands.  This 
greatly  angered  the  New  England  colonies. 

In  1767,  were  passed  the  Townshend  Acts,  laying  duties 
on  glass,  lead,  colors,  paper,  and  tea.  Then  troops  were  sent 
over  to  see  that  these  laws  were  executed,  and,  by  the 
Quartering  Act  of  1765,  our  fathers  were  required  to  shelter 
and  feed  these  soldiers.  This  monstrous  demand  led  (  1770) 
to  the  famous  "Boston  Massacre." 

Meanwhile,  the  policy  of  boycotting  went  on.  The  noble 
women  of  the  colonies  showed  their  patriotism  by  boycott- 
ing tea.  The  Boston  Tea  Party  is  cool  compared  with  some 
tea  parties  in  which  tea  was  conspicuous  by  its  absence. 
Prominent  ladies  of  Carolina  "resolved"  that  they  would 
not  touch  the  tyrannical  weed.  A  young  lady  of  Williams- 
burg,  Virginia,  declined  to  drink  tea  with  Lord  Dunmore  at 


4 
' 


38  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

a  reception,  and  was  warmly  rebuked  by  him  as  a  hot-headed 
scion  of  a  fire-eating  sire. 

For  refusing  to  shelter  and  feed  the  British  troops,  the 
New  York  assembly  was  forbidden  to  pass  any  laws.  For 
its  bold  conduct,  the  assembly  of  Massachusetts  was  dis- 
solved by  order  of  the  king.  This  body  used  to  adjourn  to 
Faneuil  (Funel)  Hall,  afterwards  called  the  "Cradle  of 
Liberty."  The  Virginia  House  of  Burgesses,  when  dis- 
solved for  its  boldness,  used  to  meet  in  the  old  Raleigh 
Tavern,  so  famous  in  colonial  and  revolutionary  history. 

What  Grenville  and  Townshend  could  not  do  to  anger 
the  colonists,  Lord  North  succeeded  in  doing.  From  1768 
to  1782,  he  and  George  III  together  left  no  stone  unturned 
to  alienate  our  fathers  from  the  mother  country. 

Troops  were  sent  to  Boston  to  see  that  the  Townshend 
Acts  were  enforced.  In  the  state  of  feeling  that  existed, 
fights  between  the  soldiers  and  the  citizens  were  bound  to 
occur.  The  most  famous  of  these  conflicts  is  the  "Boston 
Massacre,"  which  occurred  March  6,  1770,  and  in  which 
four  citizens  were  killed  and  several  wounded. 

Meanwhile,  the  colonists  were  boycotting  British  goods  of 
almost  every  kind.  Agreements  were  made  all  over  the 
country  not  to  import  goods  of  British  manufacture.  All 
were  boycotted  because  of  the  principle  of  "taxation  with- 
out representation."  "Tea,"  about  1773,  became  a  war  cry 
of  rebellion. 

The  Boston  Tea, Party  of  December,  1773,  is  famous  in 
history.  The  boldness  of  a  party  of  Bostonians  who  dis- 
guised themselves  as  Mohawk  Indians  and  emptied  more 


THE  SOUTH  IN  OLDEN  DAY8  39 

than  three  hundred  chests  of  tea  into  the  harbor,  has  been 
well  chronicled  by  sons  of  New  England.  Not  so  well 
known,  however,  are  the  tea  parties  of  Charleston,  Annap- 
olis, and  other  Southern  towns  and  cities.  It  was  in  the 
same  month  in  which  the  Boston  Tea  Party. took  place  that 
the  people  of  Charleston  refused  to  buy  or  to  handle  the 
hated  stuff,  and  the  tea  was  left  to  moulder  in  the  cellars 
where  it  was  stored.  In  October,  1774,  Annapolis  gave  her 
entertainment,  the  brig  Peggy  Stuart  with  her  cargo  of  tea 
being  publicly  burned  by  citizens  of  that  once-loyal  town  of 
Maryland. 

These  acts  cannot  be  fully  justified.  Our  fathers  of  that 
era  were  sometimes  swept  off  their  feet  by  passion  and  ex- 
citement, just  as  we  are  in  our  day;  but  their  hearts  were  in 
the  main  right,  and  their  occasional  lawlessness  must  be  for- 
given if  not  justified. 

All  those  bold  acts  infuriated  King  George  and  his  hench- 
men. Instead  of  trying  to  appease  the  Americans,  they  pour- 
ed oil  on  the  flames.  To  punish  the  colonists,  they  passed 
the  "Intolerable  Acts,"  the  worst  of  which  closed  up  the 
port  of  Boston,  thus  paralyzing  business  and  threatening 
starvation  to  thousands.  This  helped  to  unify  the  colonists  ; 
and  the  cry,  "The  cause  of  Boston  is  the  cause  of  us  all," 
rang  from  Georgia  to  New  Hampshire.  South  Carolina 
sent  200  barrels  of  rice;  North  Carolina,  $10,000  in  money; 
Virginia,  money  and  resolutions  of  sympathy.  At  a  meet- 
ing of  the  freeholders  of  Fairfax  county,  Virginia,  Maj. 
George  Washington,  the  hero  of  Braddock's  campaign,  gave 
$250  to  the  poor  of  Boston,  and  offered  to  march  1,000  men 
at  his  own  expense  to  resist  English  tyranny. 


40  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

Meantime,  North  Carolina  had  poured  out  the  first  blood 
of  the  Revolution.  In  the  spring  of  1771,  some  of  her  brave 
sons  rose  up  against  the  tyranny  of  Tryon,  the  royal  gover- 
nor, and  at  the  river  Alamance,  on  May  16  of  that  year, 
North  Carolina  patriots  shed  the  first  blood  spilt  in  armed 
conflict  between  England  and  her  colonies.  The  line,  how- 
ever, was  not  yet  very  closely  drawn  between  the  parties; 
for  on  Tryon's  side  fought  Col.  Richard  Caswell,  after- 
wards so  famous  as  a  patriot  leader.  The  two  hundred 
killed  and  wounded  were  American  martyrs  to  liberty,  and 
their  names  should  be  recorded  on  our  annals. 

Two  years  after  this,  that  is,  in  1773,  Virginia  suggested 
a  plan  of  correspondence  between  the  colonies.  This  had  al- 
ready been  tried  on  a  small  scale  in  Massachusetts,  where 
a  system  of  correspondence  between  the  various  counties 
had  been  adopted  through  the  influence  of  the  famous  Sam- 
uel Adams.  Virginia's  move  was  one  of  far-reaching  im- 
portance. Hitherto,  the  individual  colonies  had  stood  sepa- 
rate and  alone  against  George  III  and  his  tyrannical  meas- 
ures ;  now  they  are  to  stand  shoulder  to  shoulder.  The  most 
eminent  men  were  appointed  on  these  committees  of  cor 
respondence.  Dispatched  by  swift  messengers  from  colony 
to  colony,  the  letters  of  these  great  men  told  of  every  new 
encroachment  upon  the  rights  of  the  Americans.  A  promi- 
nent colonist  living  temporarily  in  England  wrote  to  friend' 
at  home  that  this  system  of  cooperation  on  the  part  of  the 
colonies  had  "struck  a  greater  panic  into  the  ministers"  of 
George  III  than  anything  that  had  taken  place  since  the 
times  of  the  Stamp  Act.  Of  Virginia's  part  in  this  great 
movement,  the  eminent  northern  historian  Bancroft  says, 


THE  SOUTH  IN  OLDEN  DATS  41 

"Whether  that  great  idea  should  become  a  reality  depended 
upon  Virginia." 

(2)  MECKLENBURG  AND  ST.  JOHN'S  CHURCH 

Two  years  later,  met  the  immortal  Virginia  Conven- 
tion of  1775.  This  convention  ordered  that  steps  be  taken 
"for  embodying,  arming,  and  disciplining  such  a  number  of 
men  as  may  be  sufficient"  to  protect  the  colony  against  ag- 
gression— the  first  action  taken  by  any  colony  looking 
towards  armed  resistance  against  England.  This  conven- 
tion is  likewise  famous  on  account  of  the  third  great  speech 
of  Patrick  Henry,  the  one  known  to  every  schoolboy  in 
America.  Old  St.  John's  Church,  Richmond,  in  which  the 
convention  met,  is  one  of  the  most  famous  buildings  in 
America  and  thousands  of  strangers  visit  it  every  year,  and 
stand  where  Henry  stood  as  he  cried,  "Give  me  liberty  or 
give  me  death."  An  interesting  incident  of  this  convention 
is  recorded.  Edward  Carrington,  of  Charlotte  county,  was 
standing  in  the  churchyard,  listening  through  a  window,  as 
Henry  uttered  those  immortal  words.  "Let  me  be  buried 
on  this  very  spot,"  cried  the  enthusiastic  and  awe-struck 
man;  and,  thirty-five  years  later,  his  remains  were  laid  on 
the  very  spot  where  he  had  stood  as  he  listened  to  the  orator. 

The  month  of  May.  1775,  is  famous  for  the  "Mecklen- 
burg Declaration,"  so  dear  to  North  Carolina.  As  to  this 
declaration,  historians  differ;  but  the  oldest  of  Virginia's 
living  historical  investigators  says :  "Beyond  all  reasonable 
doubt,  the  first  actual  declaration  of  independence  was  made 
by  the  people  of  the  county  of  Mecklenburg,  in  North  Caro- 


42  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

lina,  on  the  2Oth  of  May,'  1775 In 

the  immortal  instrument  of  July  4,  1776,  Mr.  Jefferson 
is  supposed  to  have  been  aided  by  this  Carolina  declaration." 
Mr.  John  Fiske,  in  arguing  that  the  declaration  is  a  mere 
"legend,"  and  that  no  such  paper  was  drawn  up  on  the  2Oth 
of  May,  admits  that,  on  the  3ist  of  that  month,  the  Meck- 
lenburg patriots  "ventured  upon  a  measure  more  decided 
than  any  that  had  yet  been  taken  in  any  part  of  the  country." 
Though  the  day  is  disputed,  most  scholars  accept  the  fact. 

The  people  of  Mecklenburg  county  established  an  inde- 
pendent county  "government.  They  threw  defiance  in  the 
face  of  England.  The  only  question  of  doubt  is  whether 
their  independence  was  temporary  or  permanent;  and  this 
is  one  point  on  which  historians  differ. 

Whatever  this  brave  county  undertook,  no  colony  had  as 
yet  dreamed  of  absolute  independence.  Early  in  September, 
1775,  the  Provincial  Congress  of  North  Carolina  unani- 
mously resolved,  and  called  Almighty  God  to  bear  them 
witness,  that  it  was  the  earnest  wish  and  prayer  of  North 
Carolina  to  be  honorably  reconciled  with  the  mother 
country. 

The  British  called  Mecklenburg  county  "the  hornet's 
nest."  It  is  the  mother  of  patriots  and  heroes,  the  Polks  be- 
ing especially  distinguished.  Colonel  Thomas  Polk  was 
very  active  in  calling  the  Convention  of  1775,  and  read  the 
declaration  from  the  steps.  His  son  William,  though  a 
mere  youth,  distinguished  himself  in  the  Revolutionary 
War;  and  William's  son,  Leonidas,  wras  an  eminent  general 
in  the  Confederate  army. 

Georgia  had   her  revolutionary  powder  parties,   which 


THE  SOUTH  IN  OLDEN  DAYS  43 

should  be  known  to  all  Americans.  When  the  news  of  the 
battle  of  Lexington  reached  Savannah,  a  body  of  patriots, 
among  whom  Joseph  Habersham  and  Edward  Telfair  were 
especially  prominent,  took  possession  of  the  royal  magazine 
in  that  city,  and  seized  more  than  five  hundred  pounds  of 
powder  for  the  defense  of  the  people  of  Georgia.  '  A  little 
later, a  British  powder  ship,  bearing  13,000  pounds  of  pow- 
der for  the  use  of  the  royal  troops,  arrived  at  Tybee  Island, 
below  Savannah ;  again,  the  heroic  Habersham  was  ready  to 
serve  his  country.  With  a  party  of  thirty  volunteers,  he  cap- 
tured this  powder,  stored  8,000  pounds  in  a  magazine  in  Sa- 
vannah, and  sent  5,000  pounds  to  Boston,  just  in  time  to  be 
of  effectual  use  at  the  battle  of  Bunker  Hill.  In  January, 
1776,  Habersham  did  a  still  bolder  thing.  The  Committee 
of  Safety  in  Savannah,  believing  that  the  royal  governor 
was  about  to  imitate  the  conduct  of  the  infamous  Governor 
Dunmore,  of  Virginia,  determined  to  arrest  him.  This  re- 
quired a  man  of  nerve  and  courage,  and  Habersham  under- 
took to  do  it.  Entering  the  council-chamber  while  the  king's 
council  was  in  session,  Habersham  laid  his  hand  upon  the 
governor's  shoulder,  and  said,  "Sir  James,  you  are  my 
prisoner!"  The  governor's  person  was  secured,  but  he  was 
treated  with  the  respect  due  his  rank  and  dignity.  "Thus," 
says  a  Northern  writer,  "Colonel  Habersham  put  an  end  to 
royal  rule  in  Georgia." 

The  Northern  historians  themselves  have  immortalized 
the  deeds  of  the  revolutionary  South :  "The  blessing  of 
Union,"  says  Bancroft,  "is  due  to  the  warm-heartedness  of 
South  Carolina."  Of  Virginia,  the  same  high  authority 
writes:  "In  this  manner,  Virginia  laid  the  foundations  of 


44  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

our  Union."  Another  eminent  Northern  man,  Robert  C. 
Winthrop,  says  of  Virginia:  "It  was  union  which  opened 
our  independence ;  and  there  could  have  been  no  union  with- 
out the  influence  and  cooperation  of  that  great  leading 
Southern  colony." 

VII 

Independence 

(i)  1772  AND  1775 

All  the  measures  taken  by  the  colonists  were,  thus  far, 
purely  in  self-defense.  Absolute  and  final  independence  of 
England  was  not  dreamed  of  by  any  large  number.  Ameri- 
cans at  first  threw  off  the  government  of  George  III,  just 
as  an  injured  wife  sometimes  leaves  her  husband,  and 
throws  off  his  authority  until  he  makes  apology  and  repara- 
tion. The  idea  of  complete  independence  took  root  slowly. 

Meanwhile  local  governments  were  being  organized. 
This  was  the  result,  in  large  part,  of  the  battle  of  Lexington, 
which  really  precipitated  the  war  long  threatening.  First 
came  the  Mecklenburg  Declaration.  A  few  days  later,  June 
4,  1775,  the  Provincial  Congress  of  South  Carolina  "or- 
ganized an  association  which  was  practically  a  provisional 
government  of  the  people."  This  is  claimed  by  a  distin- 
guished Southern  historian  as  "the  first  independent  or  revo- 
lutionary government  set  up  in  any  of  the  colonies."* 

*General  Edward  McCrady,  of  South  Carolina. 


THE  SOUTH  IN  OLDEN  DATS  45 

This  action  of  South  Carolina  was  forestalled,  however, 
by  other  Southern  patriots,  and  their  champion  is  Theodore 
Roosevelt,  whose  pen  has  done  no  little  to  glorify  the  South 
and  its  heroes.  In  his  Winning  of  the  West,  Roosevelt  tells 
us  that  the  western  pioneers  of  the  Watauga  settlement  or- 
ganized a  government  at  the  headwaters  of  the  Tennessee 
river,  in  1772,  and  that  "they  were  the  first  men  of  Ameri- 
can birth  to  establish  a  free  and  independent  commonwealth 
on  the.continent."  These  men  of  Watauga  were  refugeeing 
from  the  tyranny  of  Tryon,  the  despotic  royal  governor  of 
North  Carolina.  Their  leader  was  James  Robertson,  of 
Wake  county,  North  Carolina,  who  is  known  in  history  as 
"the  father  of  Tennessee."  Another  eminent  Southerner 
comes  now  upon  the  canvas.  It  is  John  Sevier,  of  Virginia, 
who,  in  1772,  joined  James  Robertson,  and  helped  him  to 
lay  the  foundations  of  the  state  of  Tennessee. 

Let  us  summarize  briefly :  In  the  matter  of  setting  up  an 
independent  revolutionary  government,  Massachusetts  was 
the  first  Northern  colony;  South  Carolina  was  a  month  or 
more  ahead  of  Massachusetts ;  but  North  Carolinians,  led  by 
a  North  Carolinian,  were  three  years  ahead  of  both  Massa- 
chusetts and  South  Carolina. 

We  have  gladly  quoted  Roosevelt,  the  Northern  historian. 
As,  however,  the  lamented  J.  L.  M.  Curry  is  better  known 
in  the  South  as  an  authority  on  such  matters,  we  will  say 
that  he  also  makes  this  statement  as  to  the  priority  of  the 
Watauga  revolutionary  government. 

The  year  1775  was  a  critical  year  in  the  revolutionary 
movement.  The  battles  of  Lexington  and  Concord;  the 
Mecklenburg  Declaration;  the  establishment  of  revolution- 


46  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

ary  governments  in  some  of  the  colonies;  the  fight  with 
Dunmore  at  Great  Bridge — all  helped  to  precipitate  actual 
independence.  Virginia  had  been  quite  conservative  until 
Dunmore  seized  the  powder  stored  by  the  colonists  in  Wil- 
liamsburg  for  defense  against  the  Indians,  urged  the  ne- 
groes to  rise  against  their  masters,  and,  on  New  Year's  Day, 
1776,  burned  Norfolk,  the  principal  town  of  Virginia. 
Then,  independence  began  to  be  discussed  quite  freely. 
"During  the  winter  and  spring,  the  revolutionary  feeling 
waxed  in  strength  daily."  Still,  no  colony  was  willing  to 
cut  itself  off  from  the  mother  country.  They  still  called  it 
"home,"  and  hoped  that  terms  of  peace  honorable  to  all 
might  be  agreed  upon. 

(2)  THE  YEAR  1776 

On  the  loth  of  February,  1776,  a  bold  step  forward  was 
taken  by  Christopher  Gadsden,  of  South  Carolina.  This 
fearless  patriot  said,  in  the  Provincial  Congress  of  his  state, 
that  he  was  in  favor  of  the  absolute  independence  of 
America.  This,  says  the  historian  Drayton,  "came  like  an 
explosion  upon  the  members."  John  Rutlcdge,  who  later  on 
came  reluctantly  and  slowly  to  the  side  of  total  independ- 
ence, rebuked  Gadsden  for  his  intemperate  language,  and 
the  Provincial  Congress  refused  to  tolerate  Gadsden's  sug- 
gestion. 

Early  in  1776,  however,  matters  approached  a  crisis.  The 
efforts  of  England  to  hire  troops  from  Russia  and  her  suc- 
cess in  securing  mercenaries  from  parts  of  Germany  in- 
furiated all  the  Americans.  About  the  same  time  an  epoch- 


THE  SOUTH  IN  OLDEN  DATS  47 

making  book  was  published.  Just  as  Uncle  Tom's  Cabin 
(1852)  helped  to  fire  the  Northern  heart  against  slavery 
and  to  inflame  the  South  by  its  partisan  treatment  of  the 
subject,  so  Thomas  Paine's  Common  Sense,  though  con- 
taining much  nonsense,  had  enough  shrewd  practical  wis- 
dom to  produce  a  wonderful  effect  upon  the  people  of  all 
the  colonies.  Paine  said  nothing  new  and  original.  He  an- 
ticipated the  Biglozv  Papers  by  contemptuous  ridicule  of 
the  other  side,  anticipated  Uncle  Tom's  Cabin  by  a  shrewd 
and  plausible  misrepresentation  of  the  enemy's  position,  and 
put  in  caustic  and  catching  style  the  arguments  that  such 
men  as  Samuel  Adams  had  been  for  years  advancing.  The 
pamphleteers  are  mightier  than  the  statesmen. 

On  the  1 2th  of  April,  1776,  the  "Old  North  State"  spoke 
out.  On  that  day,  the  North  Carolina  Congress  authorized 
their  delegates  in  the  Continental  Congress  to  "concur" 
with  the  delegates  of  the  other  colonies  in  throwing  off  al- 
legiance to  England;  and  this,  say  Northern  historians, 
Fiske  and  others,  was  "the  first  explicit  sanction  given  by 
any  state  to  the  idea  of  .independence."  Even  South  Caro- 
lina was  behind  her  big  sister.  She  had  just  sent  delegates 
to  Congress  without  any  very  definite  instructions.  Along 
with  Georgia  and  Maryland,  she,  about  this  time,  agreed 
to  join  in  any  movement  for  the  general  welfare.  On  the 
1 5th  of  May,  Virginia  took  a  bolder  stand  than  fearless  old 
North  Carolina.  She  declared  in  favor  of  total  separation, 
and  took  steps  to  draft  a  constitution,  which  was  adopted 
June  29,  and  was  the  first  constitution  of  a  free  common- 
wealth on  the  continent. 

Meanwhile,  individuals  were  doing  bold  things  on  their 


48  HALF-HOURS  I3T  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

own  authority.  April  23,  Chief-Justice  Dray  ton,  of  South 
Carolina,  told  his  grand  jury  that  George  III  had  abdicated 
the  government,  and  that  South  Carolina  was  free  and  in- 
dependent. Drayton  and  Gadsden  moved  too  fast  at  this 
time  for  most  of  the  South  Carolinians.  There  were  a  great 
many  Tory  merchants  and  planters  in  the  east  of  the  state; 
while  the  Germans  of  the  upper  country  had .  so  much  more 
liberty  than  they  were  used  to  at  home  that  they  did  not 
become  roused  up  until  Tarleton  went  to  Carolina  and  liter- 
ally rode  over  the  people. 

The  year  1776,  then,  was  the  year  of  independence.  Many 
prominent  South  Carolinians  took  a  bold  position.  North 
Carolina  was  the  first  colony  to  sanction  independence,  and 
Virginia,  a  month  later,  used  still  bolder  language. 

The  vote  for  independence  in  Congress  was  at  first  far 
from  unanimous.  The  Southern  colonies  were  more  out- 
spoken than  the  Northern ;  but  even  one  of  the  former  had 
to  be  persuaded.  Pennsylvania  was  slow  in  voting  for  the 
declaration.  New  York  had  given  no  instructions  to  her 
delegates,  and  they  were  very  nervous ;  but,  on  July  9,  New 
York  ratified  the  declaration. 

The  Declaration  of  Independence  was  really  a  war  meas- 
ure. It  was  the  triumph  of  a  party,  of  the  extreme  liberty 
party  led  by  the  Adamses,  Gadsden,  and  other  fearless  pa- 
triots. Some  of  the  delegates  had  no  idea  of  the  seriousness 
of  the  step  they  were  taking,  but  changed  their  votes  as  a 
man  might  do  on  any  question  of  expediency.  One  promi- 
nent delegate,  in  writing  to  the  president  of  his  state,  men- 
tioned, parenthetically,  that  they  had  declared  the  independ- 
ence of  America.  They  builded  better  than  they  knew. 


THOMAS   JEFFERSON 


THE  SOUTH  IN  OLDEN  DAYS  49 

Though  the  Continental  Congress  was  nothing  more  than  a 
vigilance  committee  of  prominent  citizens  with  no  authority 
to  bind  the  people,  its  acts  of  July  4,  1776,  were  ratified  by 
all  concerned,  and  all  the  members  are  now  familiarly 
known  as  "signers." 

The  Declaration  of  Independence  did  not  and  could  not 
create  a  nation.  To  say  otherwise  is  to  pervert  history. 

The  month  of  June,  1776,  is  immortal.  In  that  month 
Virginia  adopted  the  Declaration  of  Rights,  drawn  up  by 
George  Mason.  This  great  paper,  commonly  called  the  Vir- 
ginia Bill  of  Rights,  was  the  first  declaration  of  rights  ever 
passed  on  this  continent.  It  placed  George  Mason,  the  Vir- 
ginia planter,  among  the  supreme  political  thinkers  of  the 
world.  He  has  been  called  "the  pen  of  the  Revolution,"  a 
title  which  is  also  accorded  Thomas  Jefferson. 

Most  features  of  the  Bill  of  Rights  were  familiar  to  all 
Englishmen.  They  were  but  concise  rehearsals  of  clauses  of 
the  Magna  Charta,  and  of  the  English  Declaration  of  Rights 
of  1689.  Mason  was  saying  nothing  new,  but  was  saying  it 
for  the  first  time  on  the  western  continent.  One  clause, 
however,  was  magnificently  new.  If  only  the  last  clause  of 
Mason's  paper  had  been  adopted  by  the  Virginia  statesmen, 
it  would  have  made  these  men  and  Virginia  famous  through- 
out the  ages.  This  was  the  clause  in  regard  to  religious 
freedom.  Never  before,  says  William  Wirt  Henry,  had  any 
civil  government  in  the  whole  world  allowed  the  claim  of 
absolute  religious  freedom.  Individuals  here  and  there  had 
suggested  it.  More,  in  his  Utopia,  told  of  the  wonderful 
land  where  men  might  enjoy  religions  freedom;  but  men 
laughed  at  this  as  at  other  Utopian  visions.  The  Puritans  of 


50  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

New  England  persecuted  Episcopalians,  Roman  Catholics, 
and  Quakers.  The  Cavaliers  of  Virginia  persecuted  Quak- 
ers, Baptists,  Puritans,  and  Roman  Catholics.  "Baltimore 
only  professed  to  make  free  soil  for  Christianity."*  Penn's 
laws  of  1682  tolerated  none  but  believers  in  God,  and  per- 
mitted none  but  Christians  to  hold  office.  " Williams's  char- 
ter was  expressly  to  propagate  Christianity,  and  under  it  a 
law  was  enacted  excluding  all  except  Christians  from  the 
rights  of  citizenship,  and  including  in  the  exclusion  Roman 
Catholics."f 

Williams  was  greater  than  laws  and  charter.  He  believed 
in  absolute  religious  freedom.  Rhode  Island  in  his  day  be- 
came a  house  of  refuge  for  men  of  all  religions  and  of  no 
religion.  Williams  was  a  great  and  remarkable  man.  He 
towered  like  a  colossus  above  the  other  religious  thinkers  of 
his  era.  After  all,  however,  he  was  but  the  leader  of  a  small 
band  of  religionists,  too  feeble  to  affect  the  course  of  his- 
tory. If  we  reject  the  opinions  of  Henry  and  Winsor,  and 
say  that  the  Rhode  Island  colony  was  more  than  a  hundred 
years  ahead  of  Virginia  in  time,  what  is  the  situation  ?  Just 
this :  Williams  and  his  little  band  were  a  colony  of  religion- 
ists fleeing  from  persecution,  and  were  in  need  of  toleration. 
The  Virginia  Convention  of  1776,  on  the  other  hand,  was 
composed  largely  of  churchmen,  who  needed  no  protection, 
and  who  saw,  with  prophetic  statesmanship,  that  a  great 
democracy  must  ultimately  rest  upon  absolute  freedom  of 
religious  opinion. 


*W.  W.  Henry  and  Justin  Winsor, 
•{•Henry  and  Winsor. 


THE  SOUTH  IN  OLDEN  DATS  61 

No  greater  body  of  men  ever  sat  in  the  Roman  senate  or 
met  in  the  agora  at  Athens. 

VIII 

The  Sooth  in  the  War  of  the  Revolution 
(i)  HEROES  AND  HEROINES 

(a)  MARYLAND 

The  "Maryland  Line"  is  famous  in  history.  Through- 
out the  whole  of  the  Revolutionary  War,  this  body  of 
troops  were  famed  for  their  gallantry.  At  the  battle  of 
Brooklyn  Heights,  "the  highest  honors"  were  won  by  the 
Maryland  brigade  under  Smallwood ;  and,  at  the  disastrous 
battle  of  Camden,  almost  the  only  honors  fell  to  the  men 
of  Maryland.  Again,  at  Eutaw  Springs,  they  "drove  the 
finest  infantry  of  England  before  them  with  the  bayonet." 

One  of  the  most  eminent  soldiers  of  Maryland  is  William 
Smallwood.  At  Brooklyn  Heights,  White  Plains,  and  Fort 
Washington,  the  "Maryland  Line"  under  his  command  dis- 
tinguished themselves.  At  Germantown,  they  "retrieved 
the  day  and  captured  part  of  the  enemy's  camp."  For  his 
gallantry  at  Camden,  where  "Gates's  laurels  turned  to  wil- 
lows," Smallwood  received  the  thanks  of  Congress,  and  was 
appointed  major-general. 

Another  popular  hero  is  John  Eager  Howard.  As  a  mere 
youth,  he  gallantly  followed  the  noble  Mercer  at  White 
Plains ;  distinguished  himself  at  Germantown ;  and  for  his 


52  :TIALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

bravery  and  skill  at  Cowpens  received  a  vote  of  thanks  and 
a  medal  from  Congress.  It  was  the  bayonet  charge  under 
his  command  that  secured  the  victory  of  Cowpens  and  drove 
the  vandal  Tarleton  from  the  field.  "At  one  time  of  this 
day,  he  held  the  swords  of  seven  British  officers  who  had 
surrendered  to  him." 

Though  history  has  rather  overlooked  this  hero,  his  own 
state  crowned  him  with  civic  honors,  still  reveres  his  mem- 
ory, and  is  erecting  monuments  in  his  honor. 

We  can  of  course  name  only  a  few  especially  prominent 
soldiers.  In  a  rapid  outline  like  this,  however,  we  should 
not  overlook  General  Mordecai  Gist,  one  of  the  heroes  of  the 
Maryland  Line  at  Camden,  so  enthusiastic  as  a  patriot  that 
he  named  his  only  two  children  "States"  and  "Independ- 
ent;" Col.  Otho  Holland  Williams,  the  hero  of  Eutaw 
Springs,  to  whom,  at  a  critical  moment  in  that  battle,  the 
commanding-general  gave  the  order,  "Let  Williams  advance 
and  sweep  the  field  with  his  bayonets;"  and  Col.  Moses 
Rawlings,  who  led  the  Maryland  riflemen  at  the  storming  of 
Fort  Washington,  when  they,  for  several  hours,  withstood 
the  attack  of  5,000  Hessians. 

(b)  VIRGINIA 

Though  the  battle  of  Lexington  (April  19,  1775,)  pre- 
cipitated the  War  of  the  Revolution  proper,  bloodshed  had 
taken  place  already.  Of  the  battle  of  Alamance,  North  Caro- 
lina, in  1771,  we  have  already  spoken.  In  1774,  occurred 
the  bloody  battle  of  Point  Pleasant,  in  which  the  men 
of  West  Augusta,  frontiersmen  of  Virginia,  defeated  the 


THE  SOUTH  IN  OLDEN  DAYS  53 

Indians  under  their  famous  leader,  Cornstalk.  The  leader 
of  the  Virginians  was  the  renowned  Andrew  Lewis,  He  is 
regarded  by  some  as  almost  the  equal  of  Washington,  and 
his  bronze  statue  has  been  placed  by  Virginia  in  the  illus- 
trious group  near  the  state  capitol  at  Richmond.  Lewis,  on 
October  10,  1774,  builded  better  than  he  knew;  for  his  vic- 
tory of  that  day  kept  the  Indian  tribes  of  the  northwest  com- 
paratively quiet  for  the  first  two  years  of  the  Revolution,  and 
opened  the  way  for  the  settlement  of  Kentucky  and  Ten- 
nessee, and  for  the  acquisition  of  the  great  Northwest  Ter- 
ritory, from  which  several  states  were  afterwards  carved 
and  added  to  the  Union. 

It  is  almost  certain  that  this  Indian  uprising  was  instigated 
by  Dunmore,  the  royal  governor  of  Virginia.  In  the  next 
year  (1775),  we  find  him  trying  to  stir  up  a  slave  insurrec- 
tion. In  this,  however,  he  \vas  almost  as  unsuccessful  as 
John  Brown,  eighty-four  years  later,  and  for  the  same  rea- 
son ;  namely,  that  the  slaves  in  Virginia  were  so  happy  that 
they  did  not  wish  to  rise  against  their  masters. 

At  the  Great  Bridge  over  the  Elizabeth  river,  Dunmore 
built  a  rude  fort  commanding  the  southern  approach  to  the 
town  of  Norfolk.  There,  on  December  9,  1775,  his  forces 
were  overwhelmingly  defeated  by  a  body  of  patriots  led  by 
Colonel  William  Woodford,  one  of  whose  lieutenants  was 
young  John  Marshall,  afterwards  chief-justice  of  the 
United  States.  Woodford  was  made  a  brigadier-general  on 
February  21,  1777.  At  Brandy  wine,  Germantown,  and 
Monmouth,  he  served  gallantly  at  the  head  of  his  brigade. 

The  "thunderbolt  of  the  Revolution"  is  Daniel  Morgan. 
Though  born  in  another  state,  he  is  identified  entirely  with 


54  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

Virginia,  since  he  lived  in  that  state  for  fifty  years,  com- 
manded her  troops,  and  is  buried  in  her  bosom. 

Morgan  rose  from  the  humblest  to  the  most  exalted  sta- 
tion. In  Braddock's  disastrous  campaign,  he  served  as  a 
teamster.  Later,  he  was  made  captain  of  a  corps  of  ninety- 
six  riflemen,  which  afterwards  grew  into  the  famous  brigade 
that  won  the  applause  of  both  armies.  In  the  summer  of 
1775,  he  appeared  with  his  ninety-six  riflemen  before  Bos- 
ton, and  brought  a  smile  to  the  anxious  face  of  Washington, 
just  assuming  command  of  the  patriot  army.  He  followed 
Arnold  in  his  heroic  march  through  the  wilderness  of 
Maine.  At  the  great  assault  cfn  Quebec,  January  I,  1776, 
when  Montgomery  was  killed  and  Arnold  severely  wounded, 
Morgan  as  commanding  officer  fought  his  way  into  the 
town,  but  for  lack  of  support  was  taken  prisoner  with  his 
whole  detachment.  After  being  released  and  exchanged,  he 
returned  to  the  army  as  colonel  of  riflemen.  From  that 
time,  he  and  his  corps  became  the  "right  arm  of  Washing- 
ton." In  the  retreat  through  the  Jerseys,  he  rendered  emi- 
nent service  to  the  commander.  In  the  Saratoga  campaign, 
he  was  a  most  important  figure,  and,  along  with  Arnold, 
Herkimer,  and  Stark,  won  the  admiration  of  the  enemy. 
A  standard  Northern  encyclopedia  says  that  he  was  the 
"chief  instrument"  in  the  capture  of  Burgoyne.  The  British 
general  gave  most  generous  praise  to  Morgan  and  his  Vir- 
ginians. On  being  introduced  to  Morgan,  he  said,  "My  dear 
sir,  you  command  the  finest  regiment  in  the  world !"  Gates 
and  Washington  contended  for  the  honor  of  commanding 
him  and  his  famous  riflemen.  They  were  lent  by  Washing- 
ton to  Gates  for  the  Saratoga  campaign,  but  the  latter  was 


THE  SOUTH  IN  OLDEN  DAYS  55 

loth  to  return  them.  Wherever  he  served,  he  was  the  "right 
arm"  of  his  commander.  He  is  the  Stonewall  Jackson  of  the 
Revolution. 

An  imbecile  Congress  slighted  such  men  as  the  Arnold 
of  Quebec  and  the  Morgan  of  Saratoga.  The  former  allied 
himself  with  Judas  Iscariot;  the  latter,  with  Joseph  E. 
Johnston.  After  the  laurels  of  Saratoga  turned  to  willows 
at  Camden,  and  freedom  shrieked,  Morgan  joined  Gates  in 
the  South,  Congress  made  him  brigadier-general,  and  he  was 
soon  face  to  face  with  Tarleton,  famous  among  cavaliers 
and  chief  among  vandals.  At  Cowpens,  Morgan,  supported 
by  Pickens,  William  Washington,  and  John  Eager  Howard, 
crushed  an  English  army  under  Tarleton,  depriving  Corn- 
wallis  of  all  his  best  light  infantry,  and  sent  him  limping 
to  Yorktown. 

Here  ended  the  military  career  of  Daniel  Morgan:  a 
physical  malady  that  had  been  growing  upon  him  soon  com- 
pelled him  to  leave  the  service  and  return  to  his  home  in  the 
Shenandoah  Valley  of  Virginia. 

In  many  ways,  this  great  soldier  prophesies  of  a  later  citi- 
zen of  the  Valley,  and  we  'are  fain  to  call  him  brother  to 
Jackson. 

Two  of  the  great  cavalrymen  of  the  Revolution  were 
Henry  Lee  and  William  Washington.  The  latter  was  a  kins- 
man of  General  Washington ;  the  former,  the  son  of  Wash- 
ington's old  sweetheart,  spoken  of  in  correspondence  as  the 
"Lowland  beauty."  Henry  Lee  is  known  in  history  under 
the  affectionate  sobriquet  of  "Light  Horse  Harry."  At  the 
beginning  of  the  Revolution,  he  was  a  mere  stripling.  On 
July  19,  1779,  he  surprised  the  British  garrison  at  Paulus 


56  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

Hook,  where  Jersey  City  now  stands,  and  carried  off  about 
1 60  prisoners,  with  a  loss  of  only  five  in  killed  and  wounded. 
For  this  brave  deed  he  received  a  gold  medal  from  Con- 
gress. In  the  Southern  campaigns,  he  rendered  valuable  ser- 
vice to  his  country.  When  Greene  made  his  masterly  retreat 
through  the  Carolinas,  Lee  with  his  dragoons  covered  the 
rear  of  the  patriot  army. 

The  South  will  never  let  "Light  Horse  Harry"  be  for- 
gotten. In  romance  and  story,  he  is  the  Jeb  Stuart  of  the 
Revolution;  in  history,  he  is  immortal  as  the  father  of 
Robert  E.  Lee. 

Col.  William  Washington  deserves  to  be  remembered. 
When  Virginia  sent  her  sons  north  to  defend  her  sister 
colonies,  Captain  Washington,  a  mere  youth,  shed  his  blood 
in  the  battles  of  Long  Island  and  Trenton.  In  the  South,  he 
coped  with  Tarleton,  whom  he  resembled  in  all  but  his  moral 
attributes.  At  Cowpens,  under  Morgan,  he  rendered  dis- 
tinguished service,  and  along  with  Morgan  and  Howard  re- 
ceived a  medal  from  Congress.  In  this  battle,  he  and  Tarle- 
ton had  a  sabre  duel,  in  which  both  were  wounded,  and  the 
latter  had  a  good  scar  to  show  for  the  combat.  The  proud 
British  dragoon  ventured  sometime  afterwards  to  speak 
contemptuously  of  Colonel  Washington  to  some  North 
Carolina  ladies  upon  whom  he  had  thrust  his  society.  "Who 
is  this  Colonel  Washington?"  he  asked  with  a  sneer;  "I 
hear  that  he  cannot  read."  "At  all  events,"  retorted  Mrs. 
Wiley  Jones,  "he  can  make  his  mark."  Again,  he  said  to 
these  ladies  of  Charlotte,  "I  should  like  to  see  this  Colonel 
Washington."  "If  you  had  looked  behind  you  at  the  battle 


THE  SOUTH  IN  OLDEN  DAYS  57 

of  Cowpens,  you  would  have  had  that  pleasure,"  retorted 
Mrs.  Ashe,  of  a  noble  family  of  Carolina. 

A  heroic  figure  is  General  Hugh  Mercer,  of  Virginia. 
As  a  young  surgeon,  he  followed  in  1745  the  ill-fated 
Charles  Edward,  the  "y°ung  Pretender."  Emigrating  to 
Virginia,  he  identified  himself  wholly  with  that  colony.  In 
Braddock's  expedition,  he  was  severely  wounded.  The 
Revolution  found  him  practising  medicine  at  Fredericksburg, 
Virginia ;  but  his  military  ardor  was  as  great  as  when  he  fol- 
lowed the  foolhardy  leaders  of  his  youth,  and  he  offered  his 
sword  to  Virginia.  In  June,  1776,  at  Washington's  request, 
Congress  made  him  a  brigadier.  He  followed  the  com- 
mander-in-chief  through  the  Jerseys,  led  the  attacking  col- 
umn at  Trenton,  advised  the  famous  march  on  Princeton, 
and  commanded  the  advanced  column  in  the  battle.  His 
men,  mostly  militia,  began  to  waver,  and  in  making  a  heroic 
effort  to  rally  them,  he  fell,  pierced  with  several  bayonets. 

Virginia  has  permitted  a  sister  state,  Pennsylvania,  to 
outdo  her  in  honoring  the  memory  of  the  noble  Mercer; 
and  the  United  States  has  only  recently  erected  a  monu- 
ment to  commemorate  his  heroism. 

Virginia  should  never  forget  Colonel  William  Campbell, 
one  of  the  heroes  of  King's  Mountain.  In  that  battle,  so  mo- 
mentous in  its  consequences,  there  was  no  ranking  officer 
on  the  field,  and  the  other  colonels  selected  Campbell  as  their 
commander.  He  is  entitled  to  a  full  share  of  the  glory.  An- 
other one  of  these  distinguished  colonels,  John  Sevier,  was 
born  in  Virginia ;  but  we  shall  group  him  with  the  "Border 
Heroes."  Colonel  Campbell's  men  were  Scotch-Irish  of 


58  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

Washington  county,  Virginia,  and  were  of  the  same  stock 
as  the  men  who  afterwards  followed  Stonewall  Jackson. 

To  this  distinguished  list,  we  should  of  course  add  George 
Rogers  Clark,  "the  Hannibal  of  the  West."  He  gave  the 
Northwest  Territory  to  Virginia,  and  she,  to  the  Union. 
Commissioned  by  Governor  Henry,  and  leading  hardy  sons 
of  the  western  counties,  this  brilliant  young  soldier  set  out 
to  regain  a  very  large  territory  which  belonged  to  Virginia 
by  original  grant  but  which  had  lately  been  seized  and  gar- 
risoned by  England.  His  marches  read  like  a  chapter  of  ro- 
mance, or  a  history  of  knighthood. 

Clad  in  hunting  shirts,  carrying  knapsacks,  long  rifles  and 
horns  of  powder,  these  heroic  men  marched  through  the 
wilderness  and  the  boundless  forest,  traveled  in  boats  down 
the  Ohio  river,  waded  up  to  their  arm-pits  in  the  freezing 
water  of  the  drowned  lands  of  the  Wabash  river,  holding 
their  guns  and  powder  above  their  heads  to  keep  them  dry, 
compelled  the  British  to  surrender,  and  sent  the  governor  as 
a  prisoner  to  Williamsburg,  the  capital  of  Virginia. 

Thus  this  great  area  was  restored  to  Virginia.  In  1781, 
she  ceded  it  to  the  Union.  Afterwards,  five  states  and  part 
of  a  sixth  were  created  from  this  Northwest  Territory. 
Thus,  in  part,  did  Virginia  earn  her  title  of  "the  Mother  of 
States."  The  grandsons  of  the  settlers  of  these  states  were, 
in  1 86 1,  her  fiercest  and  most  indomitable  foes  on  the  field 
of  battle. 

Of  Washington  we  need  say  nothing.  To  praise  him 
would  be  like  adding-  a  grain  of  sand  to  the  seashore  or  one 
drop  to  the  falls  of  Niagara.  We  may  say,  however,  to  the 


THE  SOUTH  IN  OLDEN  DAYS  59 

young  reader  that  even  the  illustrious  Washington  had  his 
enemies,  and  still  has  his  traducers.    Shakespeare  tells  us, 

"Be  thou  as  chaste  as  ice,  as  pure  as  snow. 
Thou  shalt  not  escape  calumny." 

So  it  was  with  the  "Father  of  his  Country."  During  the 
war,  he  was  assailed  by  the  Conway  Cabal,  headed  by  an 
Irishman  and  encouraged  by  some  prominent  Americans; 
and  one  of  the  signers  of  the  Declaration  used  anonymous 
letters  to  defame  him.  As  president,  he  incurred  the  abuse 
of  partisan  papers  and  politicians,  and  was  even  accused  of 
"looting"  the  treasury.  In  our  day,  a  British  historian 
would  damn  him  as  the  murderer  of  Andre.  These  are  but 
pigmies  storming  the  rock  of  Gibraltar.  The  world  now 
puts  him  with  Alfred,  regarding  them  as  the  highest  pro- 
ducts of  the  Anglo-Saxon  race.  To  these,  posterity  will  add 
a  third— Robert  E.  Lee 

(C)  NORTH  CAROLINA 

Among  the  most  eminent  patriots  of  North  Carolina  is 
General  John  Ashe.  As  Speaker  of  the  Colonial  Assembly 
in  1765,  he  fearlessly  denounced  the  Stamp  Act,  saying  that 
the  people  of  that  colony  would  resist  the  execution  of  the 
law  to  the  death.  With  an  armed  force,  he  compelled  the 
stamp  master  to  resign  his  hateful  office.  In  1771,  however, 
along  with  Caswell  and  others  afterwards  eminent  as  pa- 
triots, he  supported  Governor  Tryon  at  the  battle  of  Ala- 
mance.  So  great,  however,  was  his  patriotic  zeal  in  1775 
that  he  was  publicly  denounced  as  a  rebel.  During  the  war, 
he  was  captured  and  thrown  into  prison,  where  he  contracted 
smallpox  and  died. 


60  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

The  Ashes  were  distinguished  soldiers,  and  their  name  is 
justly  perpetuated  by  North  Carolina. 

Two  of  the  heroes  of  King's  Mountain  were  Benjamin 
Cleveland  and  Joseph  McDowell.  They  contributed  no  little 
to  the  brilliant  victory  which  was  a  turning  point  in  the 
Revolution.  They  led  more  than  500  brave  North  Caro- 
linians, constituting  over  half  the  patriot  army. 

The  most  eminent  of  a  prominent  family  was  General 
Francis  Nash.  Though  born  in  another  state,  he  was  identi- 
fied with  North  Carolina.  As  captain,  he  served  at  Ala- 
mance  (1771)  on  the  side  of  Governor  Tryon;  but,  when 
English  tyranny  became  intolerable,  he  offered  his  sword  to 
America.  He  was  a  member  of  Washington's  staff.  In 
leading  a  brigade  at  Germantown,  he  was  mortally  wounded. 
The  city  of  Nashville,  Tennessee,  was  named  in  his  honor. 
In  November,  1777,  Congress  voted  $500  to  erect  a  monu- 
ment to  his  memory ;  but,  like  Mercer  and  others,  he  had  to 
wait  more  than  a  century  before  this  monument  was  finally 
completed. 

Among  the  partisan  leaders  of  the  South,  William  R. 
Davie  deserves  honorable  mention.  When  a  boy,  he  was 
brought  from  England  to  South  Carolina,  but,  at  the  out- 
break of  the  war,  was  living  in  the  "Old  North  State." 
Commissioned  by  her,  he  commanded  a  troop  of  dragoons  in 
Pulaski's  legion.  A  handsome  estate  he  spent  in  equipping 
cavalry  to  protect  the  southwest  portion  of  North  Carolina. 
He  distinguished  himself  at  Hanging  Rock  and  Rocky 
Mount;  and  at  Charlotte,  with  a  handful  of  men,  he  kept 
back  for  a  while  the  whole  British  army  under  Cornwallis. 
He  is  the  father  of  the  University  of  North  Carolina. 


THE  SOUTH  IN  OLDEN  DAY 8  61 

General  Richard  Caswell  was  both  statesman  and  soldier. 
In  the  latter  capacity  he  led  the  government  forces  at  the 
battle  of  Alamance,  but  later  on  turned  against  King 
George  and  his  henchmen.  At  Moore's  Creek  Bridge,  Feb- 
ruary 27,  1776,  he  won  a  victory  that  greatly  cheered  the 
patriot  cause  in  North  Carolina.  Most  of  his  time,  however, 
was  given  to  civic  office,  and,  in  this  sphere  of  usefulness, 
he  left  his  impress  upon  the  state  of  his  adoption. 

Two  other  soldiers  of  North  Carolina  worthy  of  honor- 
able mention  are  Generals  Griffith  Rutherford  and  William 
Davidson.  The  former  routed  the  Cherokees  and  Tories  in 
1776,  compelling  the  Indians  to  sue  for  peace.  General 
Rutherford,  after  the  war,  served  both  North  Carolina  and 
the  new  territory  of  Tennessee  in  high  civic  positions.  Gen- 
eral Davidson  fought  gallantly  at  Brandywine,  Germantown, 
and  Monmouth.  Sent  south,  he  lost  his  life  obstructing  the 
march  of  Cornwallis  through  North  Carolina.  The  people 
of  the  state  perpetuated  his  memory  by  naming  a  college  in 
his  honor,  and  Congress  voted  $500  to  erect  a  monument 
to  his  memory. 

If  New  England  has  her  Putnam  and  his  famous  ride 
down  the  stone  steps,  North  Carolina  has  her  William  Hun- 
ter and  his  rock.  This  Colonel  William  Hunter  was  a  noble 
patriot,  and  his  name  was  held  in  "holy  horror"  by  the 
Tories  and  the  British  soldiers.  Being  captured  by  David 
Fanning,  the  notorious  persecutor  of  his  fellow-countrymen, 
he  made  his  escape  and  hid  under  some  corn  in  a  farmer's 
wagon.  Fanning  captured  him,  and  said :  "I  am  very  glad 
to  see  you,  Colonel  Hunter.  How  did  you  pass  the  night  ? 
You  look  tired.  You  shall  be  hanged  at  once."  But  Colonel 


62  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

Hunter  would  not  be  hanged.  Just  as  Fanning's  men  were 
getting  a  rope  ready  to  hang  Hunter  to  the  nearest  tree,  he 
sprang  upon  Fanning's  horse,  famous  for  its  speed,  and 
rushed  like  the  wind  for  Deep  river,  Fanning  and  his  dra- 
goons in  hot  pursuit.  When  Hunter  reached  the  river,  there 
was  no  ford  near  him.  Just  before  him,  there  rose  out  of  the 
water  a  large  slanting  rock  too  steep  for  a  man  to  go  down. 
Hunter  dug  his  heels  into  the  horse's  flanks,  dashed  down 
the  rock  at  lightning  speed,  swam  the  horse  across  the  river, 
and  made  his  escape. 

The  "Old  North  State"  did  nobly  in  the  Revolution.  Of 
her,  Charles  Pinckney,  of  South  Carolina,  said  in  1779:  "I 
shall  ever  love  a  North  Carolinian,  and  join  with  General 
Moultrie  in  confessing  that  they  have  been  the  salvation  of 
this  country." 

Not  a41  the  heroes  can  serve  on  the  field  of  battle.  Among 
civic  heroes  and  martyrs,  Cornelius  Harnett,  called  by  Jo- 
siah  Quincy  "the  Samuel  Adams  of  North  Carolina,"  stands 
preeminent  He  made  his  first  reputation  as  an  opponent  of 
the  Stamp  Act ;  then  served  on  the  Intercolonial  Committee 
cf  Correspondence;  sat  in  the  Provincial  Congress  of  North 
Carolina;  was  for  a  while  acting-governor  of  the  state; 
exerted  great  influence  hi  inducing  North  Carolina  to  de- 
clare for  independence;  was  branded  by  Sir  Henry  Clinton 
as  a  rebel  beyond  the  pale  of  foregiveness.  On  July 
22,  1776,  after  he  had  read  the  Declaration  of  Independence 
to  a  great  throng  at  Halifax,  they  bore  him  on  their  shoul- 
ders in  triumph  through  the  town.  In  the  drafting  of  the 
state  constitution  in  1776,  he  became  the  father  of  religious 
liberty  in  North  Carolina.  He  fearlessly  dared  the  dungeon 


THE  SOUTH  IN  OLDEN  DAY8  63 

and  the  scaffold.  When  the  British  captured  the  Cape  Fear 
region,  Harnett  was  thrown  into  prison,  and  died  in  cap- 
tivity. 

In  the  War  between  the  States,  the  women  were  the  "big- 
gest rebels."  So  was  it  in  the  Revolution.  How  Southern 
ladies  could  twit  the  notorious  Tarleton,  we  have  already 
seen ;  how  they  could  fight  like  the  Amazons  of  old,  we  see 
from  the  following  story  of  Grace  Greenlee  McDowell. 
This  heroic  woman  was  the  wife  of  Colonel  Charles 
McDowell,  an  ardent  patriot  of  the  Revolution.  She  aided 
her  husband  zealously  in  his  fight  for  liberty.  When  he  was 
manufacturing  powder  afterwards  used  at  King's  Moun- 
tain, she  made  the  needed  charcoal  in  small  quantities  in  her 
fireplace,  and  carried  it  to  him  at  night  secretly.  When  the 
time  came,  she  could  use  the  powder.  Her  house  being 
plundered  during  her  husband's  absence,  she  called  together 
a  few  neighbors,  pursued  the  robbers, — Tories  and  British 
—captured  them,  and  at  the  muzzle  of  the  musket  com- 
pelled them  to  restore  her  property. 

(d)  SOUTH  CAROLINA 

The  first  decisive  victory  of  the  Revolution  was  won  at 
Sullivan's  Island,  South  Carolina,  by  Colonel  William  Moul- 
trie.  Though  most  of  his  family  were  Tories,  he  from  the 
first  was  an  ardent  patriot.  He  had  won  his  first  reputation 
in  wars  with  the  Cherokees.  When  the  Revolutionary  War 
began,  he  wras  made  colonel  of  a  regiment.  On  the  28th  of 
June,  1776,  he  drove  the  fleets  of  Sir  Henry  Clinton  and 
Admiral  Peter  Parker  away  from  the  city  of  Charleston. 


64  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

A  few  years  later,  he  was  taken  prisoner.  While  in  cap- 
tivity, he  was  offered  a  handsome  sum  of  money,  and  a 
colonel's  commission  in  a  Jamaica  regiment,  to  leave  the 
American  army*  "Not  the  fee-simple  of  all  Jamaica,"  he  re- 
plied, "should  induce  me  to  part  with  my  integrity."  He 
was  a  typical  gentleman  of  the  South  Carolina  school. 

In  his  honor,  the  name  of  the  fort  he  defended  was 
changed  to  Fort  Moultrie. 

His  fame  as  a  historian,  also,  is  well  established.  His 
Memoirs  of  the  American  Revolution  is  one  of  the  source- 
books  of  American  history. 

No  state  has  equalled  South  Carolina  in  the  skill  and  dar- 
ing of  her  partisan  leaders.  Virginia  is  proud  of  Mosby  and 
his  men,  whom  the  Federal  government  threatened  to  hang 
on  sight  as  brigands  and  assassins,  in  spite  of  the  fact  that 
Colonel  John  S.  Mosby  bore  a  regular  commission  from  the 
Confederate  government.  Kentucky  ought  to  glory  in  the 
fame  of  John  H.  Morgan,  who,  when  captured,  was  con- 
fined in  a  felon's  cell  in  the  Ohio  penitentiary,  instead  of 
being  confined  in  a  military  prison.  South  Carolina  can 
point  to  three  famous  partisans  of  the  Revolution. 

The  greatest  of  these  is  Francis  Marion.  He  served  his 
apprenticeship  in  1759  as  a  soldier  in  the  Cherokee  War. 
In  1761,  he  and  a  band  of  thirty  performed  a  brilliant  feat 
that  aided  materially  in  crushing  the  Cherokees.  In  the 
battle  of  Sullivan's  Island,  he  rendered  distinguished  service 
as  a  major  of  a  regiment.  Gates,  the  great  boaster,  did  not 
appreciate  him.  Accordingly,  he  raised  a  force  known  as 
"Marion's  brigade."  From  this  time,  he  practiced  guerrilla 
warfare.  With  a  force  varying  from  twenty  to  seventy, 


THE  SOUTH  IN  OLDEN  DAYS  65 

armed  with  rude  swords  made  from  saws  taken  from  the 
sawmills  of  his  state,  and  using  bullets  made  from  pewter 
mugs  and  dishes,  he  would  hide  in  the  swamps  and  woods 
of  the  Pedee  anj  Santee  regions,  and  rush  out  and  over- 
power much  larger  bodies  of  the  enemy.  His  name  was  a 
terror  to  both  Tories  and  British  regulars.  His  enemies 
called  him  the  "Swamp  Fox." 

He  led  Tarleton  many  a  long  and  fruitless  chase,  and 
greatly  annoyed  that  famous  marauder.  On  one  occasion, 
Tarleton,  is  said  to  have  exclaimed  to  his  men,  "Come,  boys, 
let's  go  back  and  find  the  'Game  Cock'  (Sumter)  ;  as  for 
this  infernal  'Swamp  Fox,'  the  devil  himself  could  not  catch 
him." 

In  the  Southern  campaign,  Marion  was  intimately  asso- 
ciated with  "Light  Horse  Harry."  The  account  of  him  given 
in  that  soldier's  Memoirs  of  the  war  depicts  him  as  a  hero, 
a  chevalier,  and  a  gentleman. 

An  interesting  story  of  General  Marion  will  throw  fur- 
ther light  upon  his  character.  An  English  officer  sent  to  his 
headquarters  on  a  special  mission,  was  courteously  invited 
to  dinner.  When  the  meal  was  brought  in,  it  consisted  of 
roasted  sweet  potatoes  served  on  a  shingle.  "Surely,  Gen- 
eral, this  is  not  all  you  have;  is  it?"  said  the  Englishman. 
"Indeed,  it  is,"  answered  Marion ;  "and  it  is  uncommonly 
good  on  account  of  your  visit."  The  Englishman  then  asked 
Marion  what  pay  he  got ;  to  which  he  received  the  answer, 
"None."  "Why  do  you  fight  for  a  government  that  gives  you 
no  pay  and  starves  you?"  he  asked.  "I  am  fighting  for  my 
ladylove,"  said  the  American.  "Who  is  she?"  "Liberty," 
replied  Marion. 
5 


66  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

The  officer,  returning  to  his  command,  told  his  fellow- 
officers  that  it  was  useless  to  fight  an  army  composed  of  such 
men  as  Francis  Marion.  Tradition  goes  on  to  say  that  this 
officer  resigned  his  commission,  went  back  to  England,  and 
said  that  he  would  no  longer  fight  against  a  people  with  such 
motives  and  such  leaders. 

Thomas  Sumter  was  called  the  "Game  Cock"  by  Tarle- 
ton.  In  his  fighting  qualities  and  fearlessness,  he  resembles 
Hood,  the  Confederate.  He  was  present  at  Braddock's  de- 
feat, and  later  served  against  the  Cherokees.  His  great  ca- 
reer, however,  did  not  begin  until  after  the  fall  of  Charleston 
(1780).  Shortly  after  this,  he  organized  a  band  of  parti- 
san rangers,  and  entered  upon  a  guerrilla  warfare.  At 
Hanging  Rock,  with  Davie,  the  noted  partisan  of  North 
Carolina,  he  routed  a  force  of  British  and  Tories.  Sumter's 
men,  however,  did  not  like  to  fight  in  regular  line  and  face 
artillery ;  they  preferred  irregular  warfare  and  cutting  com- 
munications, and  revelled  in  surprises.  In  such  things,  he 
and  his  band  were  masters.  Blackstock  Hill  is  his  greatest 
victory.  There,  November  2O,  1780,  he  dealt  a  stunning 
blow  to  Tarleton,  who  retreated  with  heavy  loss,  and  wrote 
Cornwallis  of  his  brilliant  victory.  Sumter's  irregular 
methods  and  his  utter  recklessness  led  to  some  unpleasant- 
ness with  other  patriot  leaders. 

Though  his  fame  as  a  soldier  was  already  secure,  it  has 
been  freshened  up  by  the  "game  cock"  exploits  of  his 
namesake,  Fort  Sumter,  in  the  War  between  the  States. 

Cornwallis  called  him  "the  greatest  plague  in  thecountry." 

Along  with  Marion  and  Sumter,  we  group  another  noted 
partisan,  Andrew  Pickens.  In  1761,  he  fought  against  the 


THE  SOUTH  IN  OLDEN  DAYS  67 

Cherokees.  In  the  Revolution  he  rose  rapidly  from  the  rank 
of  captain  to  that  of  brigadier-general.  He  is  one  of  the  he- 
roes of  the  Cowpens.  For  his  nerve  and  daring  in  that 
battle  he  was  voted  a  sword  by  Congress.  He  was  allied  by 
marriage  to  John  C.  Calhoun,  the  greatest  of  South  Caro- 
linians, and  was  the  grandfather  of  Governor  Francis  W. 
Pickens,  who  in  1861  demanded  that  the  Union  forces 
should  evacuate  Fort  Sumter. 

Pickens,  like  Marion,  was  of  Huguenot  descent.  Both  be- 
long to  a  stock  that  have  ever  known  their  rights  and, 
knowing,  dare  maintain. 

Dear  to  the  South  and  to  our  whole  country,  should  be  the 
name  of  Emily  Geiger,  the  noble  daughter  of  South  Caro- 
lina. Along  with  the  brave  Molly  Pitcher,  the  heroine  of 
Monmouth,  she  should  be  immortalized  in  the  history  of 
our  country;  for,  when  General  Nathaniel  Greene  was 
resting  his  weary  soldiers  on  the  hills  of  the  Santee  and 
keeping  them  out  of  the  sickly  and  malarial  swamps  of  the 
lower  country  of  South  Carolina,  and  it  was  absolutely 
necessary  that  he  should  communicate  at  once  with  Sumter, 
who  was  many  miles  away,  this  noble  girl  of  eighteen 
volunteered  to  pass  through  the  British  forces  and  the  nu- 
merous Tories  that  swarmed  the  country  and  bear  a  message 
from  Greene  to  Sumter.  Both  verbal  and  written  messages 
were  given  her.  Then  she  put  spurs  to  her  horse  and  gal- 
loped away  on  her  patriotic  errand — an  errand  which  a 
man  could  not  have  thought  of  undertaking.  On  being 
stopped  and  searched  by  the  enemy,  she  chewed  and  swal- 
lowed the  written  message,  made  her  way  to  General  Sum- 
ter's  headquarters,  and  delivered  the  verbal  message  which 


68  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

produced  such  a  movement  of  the  patriot  army  as  compelled 
Lord  Rawdon,  the  British  commander,  to  abandon  his  posts 
in  the  country  and  retreat  to  Charleston. 

Another  heroine  of  South  Carolina  is  Rebecca  Motte. 
Having  married  two  patriot  soldiers  and  being  sister-in-law 
to  a  third  distinguished  soldier,  Colonel  Isaac  Motte,  one  of 
the  heroes  of  Fort  Moultrie,  she  came  well  by  her  heroic 
character.  After  the  British  had  seized  her  home,  sur- 
rounded it  with  a  parapet,  and  named  it  Fort  Motte,  Harry 
Lee  and  Marion  laid  siege  to  the  fort,  but  were  loth  to  de- 
stroy the  property.  Mrs.  Motte  soon  quieted  all  their 
scruples,  and  showed  the  patriots  how  to  dislodge  the  enemy. 
Bringing  out  her  African  bow  and  arrows  especially  adapted 
to  the  purpose,  she  soon  set  fire  to  the  building,  and  com- 
pelled the  British  to  come  out  and  surrender.  Then,  with 
true  Southern  hospitality,  she  gave  a  banquet  to  the  officers 
of  both  sides. 

(e)    GEORGIA 

Georgia,  in  spite  of  her  youth,  of  her  small  population  of 
whites,  and  of  the  fact  that  many  of  her  people  were  almost 
fresh  from  England,  rendered  no  little  aid  in  the  Revolution. 
One  of  her  finest  soldiers  was  General  Elijah  Clarke.  He 
fought  the  Indians  and  Tories  on  the  frontiers ;  fought  along 
with  Sumter  on  the  Catawba,  with  Shelby  at  Cedar  Springs 
and  at  Musgrove's  Mills;  at  Blackstock  materially  aided 
Sumter;  and  in  June,  1781,  aided  by  Pickens  and  Light- 
Horse  Harry,  drove  the  British  out  of  Augusta. 

General  Lachlan  Mclntosh  is  the  most  prominent  of  a 
family  of  soldiers.  His  father  had  fought  under  Ogle- 


THE  SOUTH  IN  OLDEN  DAYS  69 

thorpe  in  Florida ;  seven  of  the  family  are  said  to  have  been 
prominent  in  the  Revolution.  Lachlan  Mclntosh  was  made 
brigadier-general  in  1776,  rendered  valuable  service 
against  the  Indians  on  the  border  of  Pennsylvania  and  Vir- 
ginia, took  part  in  the  attempt  to  drive  the  British  out  of 
Savannah,  and  was  captured  at  the  fall  of  Charleston.  After 
his  day,  the  family  continued  to  produce  fine  soldiers.  One 
of  them  distinguished  himself  in  the  Mexican  War.  In  the 
War  between  the  States,  two  brothers  rose  to  prominence, 
one  in  the  Federal,  the  other  in  the  Confederate  army. 

General  James  Jackson  was  a  distinguished  soldier  of 
Georgia.  In  March,  1776,  he  took  an  active  part  in  driving 
the  British  away  from  Savannah;  in  1778,  took  part  in  the 
defense  of  Savannah;  fought  with  Colonel  Elijah  Clarke; 
was  aide  to  General  Sumter  at  Blackstocks;  and  fought 
under  Pickens  at  Cowpens.  He  rendered  valuable  service  at 
the  siege  of  Augusta  by  Clarke,  Pickens,  and  Henry  Lee, 
and,  after  the  expulsion  of  the  British,  was  left  in  charge  of 
the  garrison.  The  Jackson  family  is  eminent  in  Georgia, 
and  has  produced  distinguished  jurists,  poets,  and  soldiers. 

More  famous  than  most  generals  is  Sergeant  William 
Jasper,  a  hero  of  Fort  Moultrie.  His  name  is  embalmed  in 
history  and  should  be  immortalized  in  literature.  During 
the  siege  of  Charleston  in  June,  1776,  while  the  battle  was 
at  its  fiercest,  the  flag  was  shot  down  and  fell  outside  the 
ramparts.  Sergeant  Jasper  sprang  down,  and,  in  spite  of  the 
galling  fire  from  the  British  fleet,  seized  the  flag,  carried  it 
back  into  the  fort,  put  it  on  a  new  staff,  and  replaced  it  on 
the  ramparts.  This  heroic  soldier  was  afterwards  killed  in 
the  siege  of  Savannah  while  acting  as  color-bearer  (1779). 


70  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

It  does  not  detract  from  Jasper's  fame  to  say  that  he  has 
had  many  noble  imitators.  In  the  siege  of  Charleston  in 
1863-1864,  during  the  War  between  the  States,  more  than 
twenty  cases  like  his  occurred;  but  his,  being  the  first,  is 
greatest  forever. 

Among  the  heroines  of  Southern  history  is  Nancy  Hart, 
whom  the  Indians  called  the  "War  Woman."  Various 
stories  are  told  of  her  nerve  and  daring.  On  one  occasion, 
a  party  of  five  armed  Tories  came  to  her  house  and  ordered 
her  to  prepare  them  a  meal.  While  she  was  carrying  out  the 
order,  they  stacked  their  arms  within  easy  reach  of  the 
table.  She  shrewdly  pulled  the  table  into  the  middle  of  the 
room,  so  as  to  pass  frequently  between  the  men  and  their 
muskets.  When  the  Tories  asked  for  water,  she  sent  her 
daughter  to  the  well,  with  private  instructions  to  blow  the 
conch  shell  which  summoned  the  men  from  the  fields,  and 
which  soon  brought  her  husband  and  neighbors  to  the  house. 
Meanwhile,  she  had  pulled  a  board  from  the  house  and 
slyly  slipped  two  of  the  muskets  through  the  hole.  As  she 
reached  for  the  third,  one  of  the  soldiers  saw  her  and  gave 
the  alarm.  She  raised  a  gun  to  her  shoulder,  threatening  to 
shoot  the  first  man  that  dared  to  come  towards  her.  One 
took  the  risk,  and  fell  dead;  then  a  second;  and  the  other 
three  were  captured,  and,  by  Nancy's  orders,  hanged. 

On  another  occasion,  she  went  to  the  British  camp  dis- 
guised as  a  man,  and  gained  valuable  information,  which 
she  conveyed  to  Colonel  Elijah  Clarke,  the  famous  soldier 
of  Georgia. 

Again,  the  Savannah  river  being  high  and  all  boats  swept 


THE  SOUTH  IN  OLDEN  DATS  71 

away,  she  crossed  from  Georgia  into  Carolina  on  a  raft 
improvised  of  logs. 

The  State  of  Georgia  has  honored  Nancy  Hart  by  giving 
her  name  to  a  county. 

(/)  HEROES  OF  THE  FRONTIER 

Among  the  famous  sons  of  the  South,  we  should  never 
forget  the  heroes  of  the  frontier.  While  the  patriots  in  the 
old  states  fought  a  few  vandals  like  Prevost  and  Tarleton, 
these  brave  frontiersmen  contended  with  the  relentless 
savage,  who,  when  crazed  with  King  George's  whiskey, 
spared  neither  sex,  age,  nor  condition. 

Preeminent  among  frontiersmen  stands  Daniel  Boone, 
the  father  of  Kentucky.  Though  born  in  Pennsylvania,  he 
is  more  intimately  allied  with  Virginia,  North  Carolina, 
and  Kentucky.  In  the  same  connection,  we  think  of  Isaac 
Shelby,  a  native  of  Maryland,  but  known  to  history  as  one 
of  the  founders  of  Kentucky.  With  several  other  Southern 
colonels,  he  won  distinction  at  King's  Mountain. 

Of  James  Robertson,  the  "father  of  Tennessee,"  we  have 
already  spoken.  With  him  we  associate  John  Sevier,  the 
first  governor  of  Tennessee,  and  one  of  the  heroes  of  King's 
Mountain.  These  two  conquered  the  Cherokees  at  the  Wa- 
tauga  in  1776,  and  thus  helped  to  secure  the  ground  won 
two  years  before  by  General  Andrew  Lewis  and  his  men  of 
West  Augusta. 

The  fame  of  these  men  is  assured :  sectionalism  has  never 
attempted  to  belittle  them.  In  the  most  recent  volumes  of 
Fiske  and  Roosevelt,  their  figures  are  thrown  upon  the  can- 


72  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

vas  in  proportions  well-nigh  colossal.  Says  the  lamented 
Curry,  one  of  Alabama's  greatest  sons :  "These  backwoods- 
men were  ardent  patriots,  and  deserve  to  be  classed  with 
their  fathers  and  brothers  on  the  Atlantic  coast."  If  An- 
drew Lewis  "blazed"  the  way  for  Sevier  and  Robertson ;  if 
these  in  turn  opened  the  way  for  George  Rogers  Clark,  and 
if  he  added  five  great  states  to  the  republic,  these  five  men, 
sons  of  the  South,  should  assuredly  be  ranked  among  our 
national  heroes. 

John  Fiske  supports  this  claim  most  heartily.*  He  spec- 
ifies "four  cardinal  events  in  the  history  of  our.  western  fron- 
tier during  the  Revolution."  Three  of  these  were  the  events 
named  in  the  foregoing  paragraph.  So  that  Fiske  clearly 
shows  that  the  South  deserves  three-fourths  of  the  credit 
for  the  fact  that  in  1783,  when  peace  was  declared  with 
England,  "the  domain  of  the  independent  United  States 
was  bounded  on  the  west  by  the  Mississippi  river." 

(2)  TROOPS  AND  BATTLES 

The  number  of  troops  in  the  Revolutionary  War  can  never 
be  known  accurately.  The  statements  made  in  some  books 
are  totally  unreliable.  The  chief  basis  of  our  knowledge  is 
the  official  report  of  General  Henry  Knox,  secretary  of  war 
in  Washington's  cabinet ;  but  he  says  himself  that  the  reports 
from  the  South  were  very  incomplete;  and  we  know  now 
that  many  men  were  counted  over  again  whenever  their 
short  terms  ran  out  and  they  reenlisted.  All  statements  as 

*A11  this  is  ably  brought  out  by  Roosevelt  in  his  Winning  of  the  West,  (I.  pp. 
240,  306)  and  by  Fiske  in  his  American  Revolution. 


THE  SOUTH  IN  OLDEN  DAYS  73 

to  numbers  in  the  Revolution  made  in  this  volume  are 
therefore  only  provisional. 

Pennsylvania,  as  said  before,  was  rather  lukewarm.  If 
Knox's  figures  be  taken  as  a  guide,  that  state  did  little  over 
half  as  well  as  Virginia;  New  Hampshire  less  than  half  as 
well  as  South  Carolina;  South  Carolina  did  three  times  as 
well  as  Pennsylvania,  and  excelled  even  Massachusetts  and 
Connecticut.  Out  of  every  100  men  capable  of  bearing 
arms,  Massachusetts  sent  76;  Connecticut,  71 ;  New  Hamp- 
shire, 43;  South  Carolina,  88. 

Neither  section  as  a  whole  can  claim  to  have  done  its 
full  duty.  According  to  Knox's  report,  the  North  sent  about 
44  per  cent  of  its  able-bodied  men  to  the  field;  the  South, 
48  per  cent.  Of  the  rest,  thousands  fought  bitterly  for  Eng- 
land. At  King's  Mountain,  for  instance,  Americans  slew 
each  other;  and  it  is  likely  that  Ferguson,  the  Tory  leader, 
was  the  only  British  soldier  on  the  battlefield. 

There  were  probably  500,000  men  of  military  age  in  the 
country ;  Washington  says  he  never  commanded  over  26,000 
at  one  time.  Contrast  this  with  the  600,000  or  more  men 
furnished,  between  1861  and  1865,  by  a  white  population  of 
about  six  million.  In  1861,  parties  and  factions  were  wiped 
out  in  both  North  and-South;  in  1775,  local  jealousies,  inter- 
state feuds,  differences  in  creed,  and  sectional  feeling,  well- 
nigh  wrecked  the  cause  of  independence. 

With  good  cause  has  it  been  claimed  that  providence,  not 
man,  freed  America. 

The  South  gallantly  aided  in  defending  her  Northern 
sisters.  At  Long  Island,  "The  highest  honors,"  says  Fiske, 
"were  won  by  the  brigade  of  Maryland  men  commanded  by 


74  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

Smallwood."  At  Trenton,  Mercer,  of  Virginia,  and  How- 
ard, of  Maryland,  with  their  "flying  camps,"  led  the  column 
of  attack;  and,  again  at  Princeton,  Mercer  led  the  ad- 
vancing column.  At  Saratoga,  as  seen  already,  Morgan's 
Virginians  turned  the  tide  of  battle,  and  this  led  to  Bur- 
goyne's  surrender. 

Besides  taking  an  active  part  in  the  greatest  victories 
won,  on  Northern  soil,  Southern  men  were  driving  the  in- 
vader from  their  own.  The  English  were  hurled  back  for 
two  years  by  the  victory  of  Fort  Moultrie.  King's  Moun- 
tain, won  by  men  of  the  South,  is  regarded  by  historians  as 
one  of  the  decisive  battles  of  the  Revolution.  A  little  later, 
the  Carolinians  defeated  Tarleton  at  Blackstock.  A  few 
months  after  that,  Southern  troops  almost  annihilated  Tarle- 
ton at  Cowpens,  and  thus  deprived  Cornwallis  of  his  cavalry. 
At  Yorktown,  later  in  the  year  (1781),  the  matchless  skill 
of  Washington,  the  Virginian,  closed  the  war  of  independ- 
ence. 

(3)  MISCELLANEOUS 

The  Revolution  was  by  no  means  a  great  popular  upris- 
ing. Very  few  of  the  colonies  were  out  and  out  in  favor  of 
fighting  England.  In  1771,  for  instance,  when  the  battle  of 
Alamance  was  fought,  Richard  Caswell,  Francis  Nash,  and 
other  great  sons  of  North  Carolina  fought  on  the  side  of 
the  royal  governor  Tryon  against  the  "Regulators;"  and 
that  colony  was  not  ready  to  rise  as  a  whole  till  four  years 
later  (1775),  when  she  heard  of  the  battle  of  Lexington. 

As  late  as  July,  1776,  a  good  many  were  very  reluctant  to 
separate  from  England.  The  Declaration  of  Independence 


THE  SOUTH  IN  OLDEN  DATS  75 

had  to  be  "lobbied"  through  the  Continental  Congress,  and 
great  persuasion  had  to  be  brought  to  bear  upon  some  of  the 
men  now  famous  as  "signers."  Pennsylvania  and  New  York 
were  lukewarm  in  the  cause  of  independence.  "Pennsyl- 
vania," says  one  of  her  own  historians,  "fought  in  the  Revo- 
lution like  a  man  with  one  arm  tied  behind  his  back." 
Washington  could  not  recruit  his  army  in  the  Jerseys. 
Maryland  was  said  to  be  full  of  loyalists.  South  Carolina 
did  not"  rise  to  her  feet  until  1778,  when  Tarleton  made  his 
infamous  raids  into  the  Waxhaws.  The  mayor  of  New 
York  was  caught  in  a  plot  to  seize  General  Washington,  and 
either  murder  him  or  try  him  for  treason.  The  British 
government  counted  upon  the  indifference  of  the  Middle 
Colonies,  and  planned  to  detach  them  from  the  Confederacy, 
and  thus  cut  it  in  half,  and  then  kill  the  ends  separately. 

In  those  "times  that  tried  men's  souls,"  Massachusetts 
and  Virginia  stood  shoulder  to  shoulder.  Though  the  New 
Englanders  and  the  Virginians  mixed  but  little  socially  and, 
as  said  elsewhere,  more  or  less  despised  each  other,  they 
united  heartily  in  the  cause  of  independence.  A  Massa- 
chusetts statesman  selected  and  urged  George  Washington 
as  commander-in-chief  of  the  patriot  army ;  and,  while  this 
was  done  largely  from  policy,  it  shows  that  great  men 
could  in  those  days  rise  above  sectional  prejudices,  and 
give  up  personal  preferences  for  the  good  of  their  country. 
Massachusetts  passed  by  her  own  John  Hancock,  to  honor 
the  Virginian  Washington. 

In  speaking  of  the  Middle  Colonies  in  the  Revolution,  we 
spoke  without  malice.  Indeed,  we  spoke  regretfully.  More- 


76  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

over,  we  are  supported  by  eminent  Northern  authorities. 
We  believe  that  those  colonies  were  held  back  by  circum- 
stances that  would  have  checked  either  Massachusetts  or 
Virginia, 

Nor  do  we  claim  that  the  South  achieved  American  in- 
dependence. We  do  say,  however,  that  in  what  was  done 
she  played  a  conspicuous  part,  and  that  without  her  there 
would  have  been  no  independence.  Of  her  part  we  are  writ- 
ing in  this  volume,  the  North's  part  being  well  told  by  her 
sons  in  thousands  of  volumes  of  history,  of  essay,  and  of 
poetry. 

Bancroft,  the  Massachusetts  historian,  says,  generously, 
that  the  men  of  South  Carolina  suffered  more,  dared  more, 
and  achieved  more  than  the  men  of  any  other  state.  Charles 
Pinckney's  opinion  of  the  North  Carolinians,  we  have  al- 
ready quoted.  McCrady,  the  eminent  South  Carolina  histor- 
ian, says  that  South  Carolina  and  Georgia  overpaid  their 
quota  of  expense,  and  that  South  Carolina  in  outlay  vastly 
exceeded  all  other  states  save  Massachusetts.  General 
Joseph  Reed,  Washington's  adjutant-general,  said  in  1776, 
"The  gallantry  of  the  Southern  men  has  inspired  the  whole 
army."  General  Gates,  in  a  letter  which  he  wrote  during 
the  war  to  Washington,  said  that  Burgoyne's  army  was 
most  afraid  of  Morgan  and  his  riflemen.  Fiske's  history  of 
the  Revolutionary  period  immortalizes  many  Southern  sol- 
diers. 

The  South  bore  the  brunt  of  the  suffering.  Two  of  her 
principal  cities  stood  long  sieges,  and  one  was  burned  by 
the  enemy.  Irregular  warfare  desolated  her  homes,  and  left 


THE  SOUTH  IN  OLDEN  DAYS  77 

her  people  without  shelter.  The  vandals  and  hirelings  of 
the  British  army  plundered  her  people  and  desolated  homes 
and  firesides. 

Probably  one-third  of  the  colonists  sympathized  with 
England.  Thousands  of  the  leading  families  of  New  York 
refugeed  to  Nova  Scotia,  Canada,  and  other  places,  to  get 
away  from  the  angry  patriots.  Many  prominent  families  of 
the  far  Southern  states  took  refuge  in  the  Bahama  Islands 
and  the  other  English  possessions.  On  the  other -hand,  Mas- 
sachusetts and  Virginia  were  from  the  first  practically  unan- 
imous against  England. 

Virginia  had  always  been  the  most  loyal  of  the  old  col- 
onies. The  tyrannical  conduct  of  George  III  had,  however, 
changed  her  sentiments.  When  Massachusetts  was  over- 
awed and  maltreated,  Virginia  nobly  took  her  part.  In  all 
sections  of  Virginia  it  was  boldly  declared  that  "the  cause  of 
Boston  is  the  cause  of  us  all." 

Most  unnatural,  therefore,  was  the  long  alienation  be- 
tween these  two  ancient  commonwealths.  Sad  was  it  that 
two  Massachusetts  pens,  Mrs.  H.  B.  Stowe's  and  Mr.  James 
Russell  Lowell's,  helped  to  increase  this  alienation.  Better 
days,  we  trust,  are  coming.  The  kind  words  of  Mr.  Charles 
Francis  Adams  and  of  Hon.  George  F.  Hoar,  of  that  state, 
are  doing  no  little  to  bring  the  two  old  sister  commonwealths 
together  and  hasten  the  dawn  of  a  better  era.  The  small 
politicians,  and  the  bomb-proof  brigadiers  of  the  editorial 
ink-pot,  however,  are  still  hurling  their  billingsgate  in  foul 
profusion,  and  postponing  the  day  of  reconciliation.  If  we 
could  only  hang  these  pygmies  and  let  the  voice  of  the  giants 


78  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

sound  from  "Boston  Plains"  to  the  Rio  Grande,  these  two 
sisters  might  soon  meet  at  the  old  fireside  and  call  a  great 
family  reunion. 

IX 

The  South  and  the  Constitution 

(i)  THE  FEDERAL  CONVENTION  OF  1787 

In  your  state  histories,  you  read  about  your  state  consti- 
tutions. Most  of  the  Southern  states  have  recently 
adopted  new  constitutions,  to  meet  the  new  conditions 
that  have  confronted  our  people  within  the  last  few  decades. 
Of  these  state  constitutions,  we  are  not  now  speaking.  Our 
present  chapter  has  to  do  with  the  constitution  of  the  United 
States,  which  was  drafted  in  1787,  and  which,  with  fifteen 
amendments,  binds  together  the  forty-seven  sovereign  states 
that  form  our  Federal  Union.  Under  this  constitution  with- 
out amendments,  the  Union  was  carried  on  from  April  30, 
1789,  to  December  15,  1791.  The  first  ten  amendments 
were  declared  in  force  on  the  date  given.  On  January  8, 
1798,  the  eleventh  amendment  was  put  into  operation;  on 
September  25,  1804,  the  twelfth;  after  the  War  between 
the  States,  three  more  amendments  were  added. 

It  is  a  most  desirable  thing  for  a  people  to  have  a  written 
constitution.  In  this  respect,  our  government  is  better  than 
that  of  England ;  for  her  people  have  no  such  great  written 
constitution,  but  a  so-called  "unwritten  constitution"  made 
up  of  charters,  decisions  of  eminent  jurists,  compacts  be- 


THE  SOUTH  IN  OLDEN  DAYS  79 

tween  king  and  people — an  undefined  and  indefinable  some- 
thing that  is  frequently  called  "the  legal  constitutional  code 
of  England." 

The  word  constitution  as  used  in  this  volume,  then,  gen- 
erally refers  to  the  constitution  of  the  United  States.  In  the 
drafting  of  this  great  paper,  this  compact  between  the  states, 
the  South  was  very  prominent,  two  men  that  stamped  them- 
selves upon  it  very  deeply  being  James  Madison  and  George 
Washington,  both,  as  you  know,  Virginians. 

The  convention  that  drafted  this  constitution  met  in 
Philadelphia,  and  sat  from  May  to  September,  1787.  Its 
president  was  Washington.  Among  the  members  were  Dan- 
iel Carroll,  of  Maryland;  Edmund  Randolph,  George 
Mason,  George  Wythe,  Madison,  and  Washington,  of  Vir- 
ginia; Charles  and  Charles  Cotesworth  Pinckney  and  John 
Rutledge,  of  South  Carolina;  William  R.  Davie  and  Hugh 
Williamson,  of  North  Carolina ;  William  Few  and  Abraham 
Baldwin,  of  Georgia.  Some  of  these  were  much  more  prom- 
inent in  the  convention  than  others;  but  history  will  show 
that  Edmund  Randolph  and  the  Pi'nckneys  were  as  influen- 
tial as  most  of  the  Northern  members,  and  that  Alexander 
Hamilton  alone  among  the  delegates  from  the  North  was 
as  influential  as  Madison  and  Washington. 

A  new  and  a  strong  constitution  was  the  most  "crying 
need"  of  our  young  nation.  To  this  need,  many  good  men 
shut  their  eyes  deliberately.  Some  feared  to  create  a  Federal 
union  stronger  than  the  states.  A  few  very  wise  men,  like 
Madison,  Hamilton,  Charles  Pinckney,  and  Washington  saw 
that  a  strong  general  government  had  to  be  created. 


80  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

The  Declaration  of  Independence  was  adopted  by  the 
Continental  Congress,  which  was  a  sort  of  standing  com- 
mittee of  the  thirteen  states.  By  tacit  consent,  that  is,  by 
being  generally  endorsed  all  over  the  country,  this  declar- 
ation became  binding  upon  the  states.  This  same  Continen- 
tal Congress  carried  on  war  against  England.  It  elected 
generals,  sent  ambassadors  to  Europe,  and  called  upon*  the 
various  states  for  money,  troops,  and  supplies.  It  was  ut- 
terly unable,  however,  to  compel  the  states  to  carry  out  its 
orders ;  each  state  "did  that  which  was  right  in  its  own  eyes," 
and  the  result  was  confusion  worse  confounded. 

In  1781,  the  states  adopted  the  Articles  of  Confederation. 
This  paper,  also,  proved  too  weak  for  purposes  of  govern- 
ment It  did  not  give  the  general  government  the  power  to 
carry  out  its  orders,  its  mandates,  and  did  not  act  upon  in- 
dividuals, like  the  constitution  of  1787.  These  Articles  were 
in  force  from  1781  to  1788,  and  these  seven  years  are  often 
called  "the  critical  period  of  American  history." 

The  young  republic  was  drifting  hither  and  thither.  Her 
money  was  practically  worthless;  her  soldiers  and  their 
families  shivering  and  hungry;  her  credit  gone;  and 
European  nations  standing  off,  laughing  at  her  calamity, 
and  ready  to  devour  her.  A  stronger  government  must  be 
created.  There  must  be  power  lodged  somewhere  stronger 
than  that  wielded  by  the  old  Continental  Congress  and  by 
the  Articles  of  Confederation. 

No  men  saw  this  more  clearly  than  Washington,  Madi- 
son, and  C.  C.  Pinckney,  Southern  representatives  in  the 
Federal  convention.  They  wanted  a  strong  Federal  govern- 


JAMES   MADISON 


THE  SOUTH  IN  OLDEN  DAYS  81 

ment,  to  act  upon  individuals  and  collect  revenue,  and  to 
command  the  respect  of  foreign  nations. 

To  the  proposed  constitution,  many  great  men  were  vio- 
lently opposed.  Patrick  Henry  "smelt  a  rat,"  as  he  said,  and 
refused  to  go  as  a  delegate  to  the  convention.  He  predicted 
that  the  new  government  to  be  created  by  the  states  would 
some  day  ride  roughshod  over  the  states ;  and  we  know  how 
fully  his  prophecy  has  been  verified,  how  it  has  been  ful- 
filled to  the  very  letter. 

The  constitution  of  1787  was  one  of  compromises,  and, 
like  most  compromises,  pleased  no  one  entirely.  It  was, 
however,  a  wonderful  paper,  and  puts  the  Americans  of  the 
1 8th  century  among  the  greatest  constitution-builders  of  the 
ages. 

Various  causes  made  it  very  difficult  to  frame  a  govern- 
ment for  the  thirteen  sovereign  states  just  separated  from 
England.  As  already  said,  there  were  dislikes  and  jealousies 
between  states  and  between  sections.  Very  bitter  was  the 
jealousy  of  the  small  states  against  the  large.  Small  states 
such  as  Rhode  Island,  Delaware,  and  Maryland  were  ar- 
rayed against  large  states  such  as  Pennsylvania,  Massachu- 
setts, and  Virginia.  This  sustains  our  statement  made  in 
previous  paragraphs  that  in  the  early  periods  the  lines  drawn 
between  parts  of  our  country  were  not  as  sectional  as  in  our 
era.  This  interstate  jealousy  came  near  preventing  the  con- 
vention from  drafting  a  constitution.  In  the  old  confedera- 
tion (1781-1788),  the  states  had  been  on  a  perfect  equality, 
the  votes  in  Congress  being  by  states.  To  give  up  this 
equality  was  a  sore  trial  to  the  small  states,  as  they  feared 
that  their  representation  in  Congress  would  be  utterly 
6 


82  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

swamped  by  that  of  the  larger  states.  This  serious  question 
was  settled  by  giving  all  the  states  equal  representation  in 
the  Federal  senate.  For  this  reason  our  Senators  in  Wash- 
ington may  be  regarded  almost  as  ambassadors  from  the 
states  to  the  Union. 

Other  obstacles  to  a  new  government  in  1787  were  the 
negro  questions  continually  presenting  themselves  for  so- 
lution. A  large  number  of  people  of  the  North  and  many 
statesmen  of  the  South  wished  to  abolish  the  slave-trade. 
This  might  have  been  done  immediately  but  for  the  ob- 
jection of  a  few  states  in  each  section.  By  a  combination 
between  these,  the  slave-trade  was  given  a  respite  of  twenty 
years,  that  is,  till  1808. 

Another  perplexing  negro  question  was  whether  the 
slaves  should  be  counted  in  the  population  and  help  to  fix 
representation  in  the  lower  House.  This,  like  the  two  ques- 
tions already  discussed,  came  near  preventing  the  adoption 
of  a  constitution.  Here,  again,  compromise  was  resorted  to. 
Under  the  leadership  of  James  Madison,  the  South  agreed 
not  to  demand  full  representation  for  her  slaves,  but  to  ac- 
cept the  three-fifths  ratio,  by  which  five  slaves  counted  as 
three  persons  in  the  population.  With  these  three  compro- 
mises, the  constitution  was  submitted  to  Congress  and,  af- 
terwards, to  the  thirteen  separate  states,  with  the  proviso 
that  it  should  go  into  effect  when  any  nine  had  adopted  it, 
and  be  binding  upon  the  states  so  ratifying  it. 

In  persuading  the  other  states  to  accept  these  compro- 
mises, Connecticut  and  Virginia  played  a  very  prominent 
part. 


THE  SOUTH  IN  OLDEN  DAYS  83 

(2)  THE  STATES  CREATE  THE  UNION 

The  most  casual  reader  must  have  seen  that  states  were 
in  the  act  of  creating  a  Union.  After  the  representatives  of 
eleven  states  had  drafted  the  paper  now  known  as  the  con- 
stitution, it  had  no  binding  force  whatever  until  ratified  by 
conventions  of  at  least  nine  states,  and  then  only  upon  those 
ratifying  it.  Each  state  acted  separately  as  a  sovereignty 
through  a  convention.  Three  states  reserved  the  right  to 
withdraw  whenever  their  interests  were  in  danger.  Two 
staid  out  of  the  Union  for  some  time:  North  Carolina, 
till  1789;  Rhode  Island,  till  1790.  After  the  ninth  state 
ratified  the  constitution,  the  other  four  might  'have  staid 
outside  as  separate  and  independent  republics;  for,  at  that 
time,  no  such  idea  as  that  the  states  were  created  by  the 
Union  had  ever  been  dreamed  of  in  our  philosophy. 

Meantime,  what  became  of  the  old  Articles  of  Confed- 
eration? They  were  styled  articles  of  "perpetual  union," 
and  yet,  in  seven  years,  they  were  coolly  set  aside  as  too 
weak  for  purposes  of  a  strong  Federal  government,  and  a 
new  paper  substituted  for  them. 

This  was  nothing  short  of  secession.  Nine  states  seceded 
and  set  up  a  new  republic,  and  no  voice  was  raised  in  pro- 
test. "Nothing  secedes  like  secession"  may  be  said  of  that 
movement,  as  well  as  of  the  secession  of  Panama  from  Co- 
lumbia in  November,  1903,  the  Roosevelt  administration 
standing  as  godfather  to  the  lusty  infant  nation  as  he  yelled 
himself  into  the  family  of  republics. 

The  word  secede  is  not  found  in  the  constitution.  To  put 
it  there  would  have  been  sheer  folly;  for  doing  so  would 


84  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

have  invited  every  discontented  state  to  threaten  secession. 
That  the  right  of  secession  was  held  by  all  sections  in  1788 
is,  however,  now  admitted  by  some  of  the  most  eminent 
Northern  men,  such  as  Henry  Cabot  Lodge  and  Charles 
Francis  Adams.  (In  another  chapter  we  shall  show  that  se- 
cession was  first  threatened  in  New  England. ) 

Bancroft  calls  James  Madison  "the  chief  author  of  the 
constitution."  The  "Virginia  plan,"  outlined  by  Madison 
and  presented  by  Edmund  Randolph,  was  adopted  in  pref- 
erence to  plans  outlined  by  Northern  statesmen.  Compro- 
mises on  various  questions  had  to  be  accepted.  Problems 
were  left  for  posterity  to  solve ;  some  of  them,  unfortunately, 
to  be  settled  on  the  field  of  battle.  But  might  cannot  make 
right,  and  gunpowder  cannot  determine  moral  questions. 
The  South  looks  to  posterity  to  prove  that  she  has  never 
violated  the  constitution. 

James  Madison  is  known  in  history  as  "the  father  of  the 
the  constitution."  In  this  connection,  we  may  quote  the  late 
John  Fiske,  of  Massachusetts :  "In  the  making  of  the  gov- 
ernment under  which  we  live,  these  five  names,  Washington, 
Madison,  Hamilton,  Jefferson,  and  Marshall — stand  before 
all  others." 

All  but  one  of  these  five  are  Southern  men.  The  name  of 
Jefferson  is  a  household  word  among  men  of  all  political 
parties.  Both  the  great  parties  of  our  day  use  his  name  to 
conjure  with,  and  claim  him  as  their  founder,  their  patron 
saint.  Of  Marshall  we  need  only  say  that  he  is  recognized 
both  at  home  and  abroad  as  the  greatest  expounder  of  the 
constitution.  Both  North  and  South  have  combined  to 


THE  SOUTH  IN  OLDEN  DAYS  85 

glorify  him ;  the  former  being  swayed  to  some  extent  doubt- 
less by  the  fact  that  he  interpreted  the  constitution  according 
to  the  view  long  popular  north  of  the  Potomac;  the  South 
being  swayed  by  her  admiration  for  his  great  abilities  and 
by  her  confidence  in  his  spotless  character.  While  referring 
to  this  supreme  chief-justice,  we  may  pause  to  remark  that, 
for  nearly  two-thirds  of  its  existence,  the  Supreme  Court  of 
the  United  States  has  been  presided  over  by  Southern 
jurists,  Taney  and  Marshall. 

We  have  seen  already  that  the  idea  of  absolute  religious 
freedom  was  born  in  Virginia.  This  idea  was  engrafted  on 
the  Federal  constitution,  the  clause  enacting  that  "no  relig- 
ious test  shall  ever  be  required  as  a  qualification  to  any  office 
or  public  trust  under  the  authority  of  the  United  States/' 
being  moved  by  C.  C.  Pinckney,  of  South  Carolina,  and 
championed  ably  by  James  Madison.  At  this  time  and  for 
several  decades  afterwards,  England  would  not  permit  any 
one  to  hold  office,  or  even  to  take  a  degree  in  her  universi- 
ties, unless  he  communed  according  to  the  rites  of  the  es- 
tablished church.  So  that  the  statesmen  and  the  legislators 
of  the  South  blazed  the  way  of  religious  freedom  for  the 
sages  of  Europe. 

To  the  head  of  the  new  Federal  government,  all  voices 
called  George  Washington.  In  his  cabinet,  sat  Jefferson, 
Edmund  Randolph,  James  McHenry,  Charles  Lee,  and 
Joseph  Habersham,  Southern  jurists  and  statesmen. 

The  foregoing  paragraphs  on  the  constitution  are  merely 
introductory.  They  are  intended  to  show  the  part  played 
by  Southern  statesmen  in  laying  the  foundations  of  our  gov- 


86  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

ernment.  The  conflicting  views  of  the  constitution,  and  the 
long,  sad  quarrel  over  its  doubtful  clauses,  we  reserve  for 
later  chapters. 

X 

The  South's  Part  in  Maintaining-  and  Expanding-  the  Union 
(i)  THE  WAR  OF  1812 

Let  us  pass  on  to  later  eras.  Let  us  study  some  statis- 
tics of  the  post-revolutionary  and  ante-bellum  periods. 
In  those  periods,  when  sectional  lines  were  less  closely 
drawn  than  they  were  afterwards,  the  Southern  states 
furnished  nine  out  of  thirteen  presidents.  Moreover,  the 
only  men  elected  to  second  terms  were  five  presidents  from 
the  South :  Washington,  Jefferson,  Madison,  Monroe,  and 
Jackson.  Are  those  facts  merely  accidental  ? 

To  return  to  the  great  wars :  Without  Virginia  and  the 
Carolinas,  the  Revolution  would  have  been  a  total  failure. 
Let  us  consider  the  War  of  1812.  In  this  second  struggle 
with  England,  sometimes  called  the  Second  War  for  In- 
dependence, the  South  again  covered  herself  with  glory.  In 
bringing  on  that  war,  the  lead  was  taken  by  Southern  states- 
men, because  the  warm  blood  of  the  young  men  of  the  South 
could  no  longer  brook  the  insults  of  England,  especially  her 
stopping  American  ships  on  the  high  seas  and  dragging  off 
sailors  on  the  pretext  that  they  were  Englishmen.  This 
war  was  very  unpopular  in  New  England,  and  was  opposed 
by  a  few  of  the  great  leaders  of  the  South,  more  especially 
the  famous  John  Randolph,  of  Virginia.  Clay,  Calhoun, 
Crawford,  Felix  Grundy,  Langdon  Cheves,  William 


THE  SOUTH  IN  OLDEN  DAYS  87 

Lowndes,  and  other  young  leaders  of  the  South  determined 
to  fight ;  and  it  is  said  that  Mr.  Madison  thought  of  making 
Clay  commander-in-chief  of  the  army.  The  South  furnished 
nearly  all  of  the  greatest  soldiers,  such  as  Isaac  Shelby, 
Zachary  Taylor,  William  Henry  Harrison,  Winfield  Scott, 
and  Andrew  Jackson,  and  fully  five-eighths  of  the  private 
soldiers.  Especially  distinguished  were  Harrison  and  Jack- 
son. Harrison,  already  famous  as  the  hero  of  Tippecanoe, 
won  the  great  victory  of  the  river  Thames,  which,  following 
the  naval  victory  of  Lake  Erie  by  Commodore  Perry,  drove 
the  British  out  of  Michigan,  and  practically  broke  the  power 
of  the  Indians  in  the  Northwest.  Jackson  won  the  great 
battle  of  New  Orleans  (January  8,  1815),  which  showed 
the  world  that  the  fighting  power  of  the  Americans  had  not 
declined  since  the  days  of  King's  Mountain,  Cowpens,  and 
Yorktown. 

Both  Harrison  and  Andrew  Jackson  became  national 
heroes.  The  former  is  known  in  history  as  "Tippecanoe;" 
the  latter,  as  "Old  Hickory."  Both  were  elected  to  the  presi- 
dency before  the  days  of  "dark  horses,"  that  is,  in  the  times 
when  both  parties  put  their  strongest  men  on  the  presidential 
ticket. 

Even  in  a  rapid  sketch,  we  may  pause  to  mention  a  few 
other  men  of  Southern  birth  or  Southern  descent  who  dis- 
tinguished themselves  in  this  \var.  We  again  meet  Isaac 
Shelby,  of  King's  Mountain.  Though  sixty-three  years  of 
age,  he  fought  under  General  Harrison,  and  distinguished 
himself  in  the  battle  of  the  Thames.  In  this  same  battle, 
Col.  Richard  M.  Johnson,  member  of  an  illustrious  family 


HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 


that  had  migrated  from  Virginia  to  Kentucky,  led  a  cavalry 
charge  that  turned  the  tide  of  battle;  and  it  is  thought  by 
many,  and  he  himself 'thought,  that  he  dealt  the  fatal  blow 
to  the  great  Indian  chief  Tecumseh,  who  was  helping  the 
British.  In  the  Southwest,  General  Jackson  was  fighting  the 
Creek  Indians,  who  were  allies  of  England ;  and  in  his  army 
fought  a  gallant  young  soldier,  afterwards  idolized  in 
Tennessee  and  in  Texas,  Sam  Houston,  the  hero  of  San 
Jacinto  and  the  father  of  Texas. 

Another  hero  of  this  war  is  Major  George  Croghan 
(Crawn),  nephew  of  George  Rogers  Clark.  At  Fort  Steph- 
enson,  in  1813,  Croghan,  with  one  cannon  and  about  160 
men,  was  besieged  by  the  British  general  Proctor  with  1,200 
British  and  Indians.  His  gallant  defense  of  the  fort  proved 
to  be  a  turning-point  in  the  war.  Croghan  received  a  gold 
medal  from  Congress,  and  was  afterwards  rapidly  promoted. 
He  afterwards  served  with  great  gallantry  in  the  war  with 
Mexico,  being  especially  distinguished  at  the  battle  of  Mon- 
terey. 

The  War  of  1812  was,  as  already  said,  very  unpopular  in 
some  sections  of  the  country.  The  South  and  the  West  were 
eager  for  it,  not  because  they  had  no  interests  at  stake,  as 
a  well-known  text-book  says,  but  because  they  saw  that  the 
nations  of  the  world  would  have  no  respect  for  us  if  we 
continued  to  bear  the. insults  of  England.  The  Middle  and 
the  New  England  States  were  as  a  rule  bitterly  opposed  to 
fighting  England.  In  Congress,  the  representatives  of  all 
these,  except  New  Hampshire,  Vermont,  and  Pennsylvania, 
voted  against  declaring  war  upon  England.  Says  the  same 


THE  SOUTH  IN  OLDEN  DATS  89 

Northern  historian*  just  referred  to:  "Thirty-four  members 
of  the  opposition  joined  in  an  address  to  their  constituents 
in  which  they  stated  in  substance  that  the  United  States  was 
composed  of  eighteen  independent  sovereignties  united  by 
bonds  of  moral  obligation  only,  and  that,  if  we  entered  upon 
the  contest  with  England,  we  did  so  as  a  divided  people."  A 
good  many  men  volunteered  from  Massachusetts  and  Con- 
necticut, but  the  governors  of  these  states  "refused  to  fur- 
nish their  quota  of  militia."  At  that  time  (1812),  the  New 
England  people  evidently  believed  instates  rights  and  in 
nullification. 

From  what  we  have  said,  it  is  clear  that  the  people  and 
the  leaders  of  New  England  and  of  the  Middle  States  were 
opposed  to  this  war  with  England.  In  a  later  chapter, 
we  shall  have  occasion  to  refer  to  the  Hartford  Convention 
(1814),  in  which  such  men  as  the  Cabots,  the  Lowells,  the 
Longfellows,  and  other  leaders  of  New  England,  were  pro- 
testing against  the  war,  and  taking  steps  towards  seceding 
from  the  Union.  All  this  is  painful,  but  it  is  history.  Our 
reason  for  telling  these  unpleasant  facts  is  to  show  that 
other  sections  besides  the  South  long  believed  in  the  right  of 
secession,  and  that  at  a  very  critical  period — in  a  life-and- 
death  grapple  with  England — our  country  was  threatened 
with  disruption  by  some  secessionists  of  other  sections. 

Greater  and  more  patriotic  than  some  of  the  leaders  of 
New  England  at  this  crisis  were  her  gallant  seamen.  How 
the  young  navy  of  our  country  met  and  worsted  the  navy 
of  England,  hitherto  invincible;  how  the  pride  and  arro- 
gance of  the  English  seamen  were  humbled ;  how  the  trade 

*D.  H.  Montgomery. 


90  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY, 

of  England  was  crippled,  and  marine  insurance  driven  up  to 
enormous  figures;  how  such  great  sea-captains  as  Bain- 
bridge,  Porter,  and  Lawrence  brought  lustre  to  the  name  of 
the  young  republic — all  this  is  a  "twice-told  tale,"  and  need 
not  be  repeated  in  this  volume. 

Duing  this  war,  the  Star  Spangled  Banner  was  com- 
posed by  Francis  Scott  Key,  the  most  famous  of  a  distin- 
guished family  of  Maryland.  This  song  and  America,  by 
Samuel  F.  Smith,  of  Massachusetts,  are  rivals  for  popu- 
larity. In  the  summer  of  1903,  the  secretary  of  war  an- 
nounced officially  that  hereafter  the  Star  Spangled  Banner 
would  be  the  national  air  for  both  army  and  navy. 

During  the  period  following  the  War  of  1812,  the  only 
"doctrine"  ever  added  by  a  president  to  the  creed  of  the 
republic  was  proclaimed  by  President  Monroe,  of  Virginia. 
In  the  famous  paper  referred  to,  President  Monroe  warned 
the  nations  of  Europe  that  no  more  European  colonies 
should  be  planted  in  America,  and  that  the  United 
States  would  not  be  indifferent  to  the  interference  of  for- 
eign nations  in  the  affairs  of  any  of  the  American  peoples. 
This  means  "America  for  Americans."  If  accepted  by  the 
world  as  a  part  of  the  law  of  nations,  it  will  make  Monroe 
more  famous  than  most  of  the  kings  and  emperors  of  his- 
tory, will  make  his  name  familiar  to  every  schoolboy  on 
five  continents. 

(2)  THE  MEXICAN  WAR 

In  1846,  war  again  clouded  the  horizon.  As  in  1812,  the 
brunt  of  it  fell  upon  the  Southern  people,  many  Northern 


THE  SOUTH  IN  OLDEN  DAYS  91 

people,  especially  the  New  Englanders,  regarding  it  as  "a 
war  of  unholy  aggression." 

As  in  the  case  of  most  wars  there  were  various  causes, 
some  remote,  some  nearer.  Long-continued  ill-feeling  be- 
tween the  United  States  and  Mexico  had  put  the  two  coun- 
tries into  such  a  position  towards  each  other  that  almost  any 
disagreement  might  lead  to  armed  conflict.  This  ill-feeling 
was  due  to  American  sympathy  with  Texas;  the  bitterness 
that. made  war  likely  to  break  out  at  any  moment  was  due 
to  the  annexation  of  Texas  to  the  United  States  (1845)  ; 
the  immediate  cause,  or  the  occasion,  of  the  war  was  the 
question  of  boundary  between  Texas  and  Mexico. 

Texas  had  rebelled  against  Mexico.  The  great  victory  of 
San  Jacinto,  gained  in  1836  by  General  Sam  Houston,  led 
to  the  independence  of  Texas;  but  this  independence  had 
never  been  acknowledged  by  Mexico.  She  gave  notice 
plainly  to  the  United  States  that  the  annexation  of  Texas 
would  be  regarded  by  Mexico  as  an  insult,  and  would  lead 
to  war  between  the  two  countries. 

The  abolitionists  of  the  North  were  opposed  to  the  an- 
nexation of  Texas.  They  thought  that  it  would  increase  the 
area  of  slavery,  and  probably  add  eight  Southern  senators. 
Massachusetts  plainly  said  that  she  would  not  be  bound  by 
any  such  action,  but  would  feel  at  liberty  to  secede  from  the 
Union.  Twenty  members  of  Congress,  Adams  of  Massachu- 
setts and  Giddings  of  Ohio  among  them,  published  an  ad- 
dress in  which  they  said  that  the  annexation  of  Texas 
would  fully  justify  a  dissolution  of  the  Union. 

In  spite  of  such  threats,  however,  the  majority  of  the 
people  of  the  United  States  voted  in  1844  f°r  "Polk  and 


92  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

Texas."  Meantime,  President  Tyler  had  been  very  active  in 
bringing  on  the  annexation  of  Texas,  and  deserves  a  large 
part  of  the  credit  for  the  accession  of  that  great  territory. 
When  Polk  came  into  office,  he  found  Texas  in  the  Union, 
and  saw  a  war  with  Mexico  almost  unavoidable. 

As  already  said,  a  boundary  dispute  \vas  the  occasion  of 
the  war  now  threatening.  Texas  claimed  that  her  western 
boundary  was  the  Rio  Grande;  Mexico  said  that  it  was  the 
Nueces  river.  Under  ordinary  circumstances,  this  question 
might  have  been  settled  by  arbitration.  It  soon  led,  how- 
ever, to  armed  conflict. 

In  the  summer  of  1845,  Mexico  sent  an  army  to  the  Rio 
Grande.  Thereupon,  President  Polk  sent  General  Zachary 
Taylor  with  an  army  to  protect  American  interests  in  the 
disputed  territory,  and  also  put  an  American  fleet  in  the 
Gulf  of  Mexico.  Soon  the  Mexicans  crossed  the  Rio  Grande 
and  attacked  the  Americans.  Thereupon  Congress  resolved 
that  war  existed  between  the  two  countries  "by  the  act  of 
Mexico."  Again  the  abolitionists  raised  a  great  cry  of  "un- 
holy aggression,"  Southern  adventftre,  and  slavery  ex- 
tension. 

That  the  South  wished  to  annex  Texas,  we  cannot  deny, 
and  do  not  care  to  do  so.  That  she  hoped  to  see  Texas  added 
to  the  domain  of  slavery,  we  also  admit  with  perfect  candor. 
These  two  wishes,  however,  were  both  constitutional  and 
honorable;  whether  they  were  expedient  or  not  is  another 
question,  and  depends  upon  the  view  one  takes  of  the  sub- 
ject of  African  slavery.  Slavery  was  an  existing  fact,  recog- 
nized by  the  constitution,  but  its  area  had  by  this  time  been 
greatly  limited  by  total  abolition  in  many  states  and  by  pro- 


THE  SOUTH  IN  OLDEN  DATS  93 

hibition  in  other  states  and  territories.  To  extend  slavery 
into  Texas  was  the  devout  wish  of  the  Southern  people. 
The  acquisition  of  Texas  was  the  result  of  the  election  of 
Polk  and  Dallas,  which  was  accomplished  by  the  Democratic 
party,  regardless  of  sections. 

Here  again,  we  see  the  South  sticking  to  the  constitution. 
Through  thick  and  thin,  through  good  report  and  evil  re- 
port, this  has  been  her  record.  Whether  the  constitution  was 
out  of  date,  a  moral  anachronism,  an  old  skin  which  the 
new  wine  was  obliged  to  burst — this  is  a  question  that  only 
an  inspired  pen  could  answer  with  authority 

General  Zachary  Taylor,  as  already  said,  had  been  sent  to 
hold  the  disputed  territory.  Here  began  his  distinguished 
career  as  a  military  hero.  At  Palo  Alto  (May  8,  1846), 
Resaca  de  la  Palma  (May  9),  Monterey  (September  19), 
Buena  Vista  (February  23-24,  1847),  tms  great  soldier 
brought  lustre  to  his  state  and  to  his  country. 

Nor  were  all  Northern  soldiers  idle  in  this  great  crisis. 
General  Stephen  W.  Kearney  set  out  in  June,  1846,  and 
marched  from  Fort  Leavenworth,  Kansas,  to  Santa  Fe,  New 
Mexico;  thence,  westward  to  California.  There,  in  conjunc- 
tion with  Col.  John  C.  Fremont  and  Commodores  Robert 
F.  Stockton  and  John  D.  Sloat,  he  snatched  California  from 
the  Mexicans. 

General  Winfield  Scott  had  been  directed  to  assault  Vera 
Cruz,  the  Gibraltar  of  Mexico.  On  March  29,  1847,  ne 
captured  this  old  Spanish  stronghold,  and  marched  towards 
the  city  of  Mexico,  two  hundred  miles  northwestward.  At 
Cerro  Gordo,  Contreras,  Churubusco,  Molino  del  Rey,  and 


94  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

Chapultepec,  the  Americans  won  brilliant  victories.  On  Sep- 
tember 14,  1847,  Scott  entered  the  city  of  Mexico,  and 
planted  the  American  flag  on  the  palace  of  the  Montezumas. 

General  Scott  says  that  his  success  in  Mexico  was  largely 
due  to  the  skill  and  the  gallantry  of  Captain  R.  E.  Lee,  of 
the  engineer  corps.  Other  engineers  worthy  of  praise  are 
George  B.  McClellan,  John  B.  Magruder,  and  G.  P.  T. 
Beauregard,  men  to  be  heard  of  in  the  '6o's. 

Two  of  the  heroes  of  this  war  were  Col.  Jefferson  Davis 
and  Gen.  John  A.  Quitman,  both  solders  of  Mississippi.  To 
the  former  and  his  famous  Mississippi  Rifles,  were  largely 
due  the  victories  of  Monterey  and  Buena  Vista ;  to  Quitman, 
was  largely  due  the  victory  of  Chapultepec.  South  Carolina 
was  represented  by  the  gallant  Major  Pierce  Butler  and 
Daniel  H.  Hill,  who  was  called  by  the  young  officers  "the 
bravest  man  in  the  army,"  and  whose  native  state  presented 
him  with  a  sword  as  a  reward  for  his  gallantry.  The  first 
body  of  troops  to  enter  the  city  of  Mexico  was  the  Palmetto 
Regiment  of  South  Carolina.  Maj.  Thomas  J.  Jackson,  of 
Virginia,  was  promoted  more  frequently  for  gallantry  than 
any  other  man  in  the  army.  Other  Virginians  worthy  of 
special  mention  were  Joseph  E.  Johnston  and  A.  P.  Hill, 
both  famous  in  a  later  struggle. 

Kentucky  sent  Theodore  O'Hara,  whose  poem,  The  Biv- 
ouac of  the  Dead,  has  given  immortality  to  the  men  that  died 
in  Mexico.  North  Carolina  was  represented  by  Capt.  Brax- 
ton  Bragg  and  his  artillery,  distinguished  at  Buena  Vista. 
Maryland  sent  Samuel  Ringgold,  the  artillery  hero  of  Palo 
Alto,  and  Charles  Augustus  May,  the  cavalry  hero  of 


THE  SOUTH  IN  OLDEN  DAYS  95 

Resaca  de  la  Palma.  Georgia  sent  General  Henry  R.  Jack- 
son, the  poet-soldier,  and  Josiah  Tatnall,  whose  little  gun- 
boat won  great  applause. 

At  least  two-thirds  of  the  troops  were  from  the  South; 
most  of  the  others  came  from  the  states  northwest  of  the 
Ohio.  As  said  already,  New  England  figured  little;  New 
Hampshire  is  said  to  have  furnished  one  soldier.  Had  New 
England  gone  into  the  war,  she  would  doubtless  have  fur- 
nished brave  troops  and  famous  generals.  The  statement  of 
Mr.  Theodore  Roosevelt  that  her  "military  spirit"  suffered  a 
great  "decline"  about  the  middle  of  the  nineteenth  century, 
as  the  money-making  spirit  grew,  will  not  make  Mr.  Roose- 
velt a  popular  author  in  New  England. 

The  Mexican  War  was  a  great  training-school  for 
soldiers.  Alongside  of  each  other  fought  men  that  were 
afterwards  to  oppose  each  other  in  the  war  between  the  sec- 
tions. Some  of  these  we  have  already  spoken  of;  others 
were  Barnard  E.  Bee,  Lewis  A.  Armistead,  Ulysses  S. 
Grant,  H.  Wv  Halleck,  Joseph  Hooker,  A.  E.  Burnside, 
George  G.  Meade,  Earl  Van  Dorn,  and  Irvin  McDowell. 

In  this  connection,  we  may  recall  an  anecdote  of  General 
Winfield  Scott.  When  the  war  of  secession  began,  he  was 
commander-in-chief  of  the  United  States  army,  and  did  all 
he  could  to  capture  the  "rebel  capital."  He  had  to  give  up 
the  idea  of  taking  Richmond,  however,  and  defend  his  own 
capital.  Some  one  asked  him  why  the  man  that  had  taken 
the  city  of  Mexico  could  not  take  Richmond.  His  reply  was, 
"Because  the  very  men  that  took  me  into  Mexico  were  keep- 
ing me  out  of  Richmond." 


96  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

Speaking  of  the  Mexican  War  and  its  heroes,  Mr.  Percy 
Greg,  the  English  historian,  says :  "As  the  Americans  ac- 
tually on  the  field  were  a  little  more  than  one  to  four,  Buena 
Vista  might  well  have  been  regarded  as  one  of  the  most 
glorious  names  in  the  military  history  of  the  United  States. 
It  certainly  entitles  May,  Davis,  and  Bragg  to  rank  with  the 
best  and  bravest  soldiers  of  the  Wars  of  Independence  and 
of  1812 — with  Greene,  Putnam,  and  Harrison."  The  her- 
oism of  Col.  Jefferson  Davis  is  frankly  admitted  by  some 
Northern  historians.  Few  writers  of  either  section,  how- 
ever, have  done  justice  to  Ringgold,  May,  Bragg,  Quitman, 
and  Tatnall,  but  have  given  the  lion's  share  of  the  glory  to 
Scott  and  Taylor,  while  General  Stephen  W.  Kearney  is 
rarely  given  either  his  full  name  or  his  initials. 

Of  the  "injustice"  and  "unholy  character"  of  the  Mexi- 
can War,  we  are  being  continually  reminded.  In  a  volume  of 
addresses  published  by  a  recent  cabinet  officer,  we  are  taught 
to  censure  our  fathers  of  the  South  for  going  into  this  war 
of  "unjust  aggression." 

(3)  MISCELLANEOUS 

If  the  South  has  had  all  of  the  censure,  she  has  had  also 
most  of  the  glory  of  the  War  with  Mexico.  Two  Southern 
presidents  had  brought  about  the  annexation  of  Texas. 
Southern  soldiers  had  done  most  of  the  fighting.  To  the 
South  is  due  the  credit  for  adding  to  the  Union  the  great 
state  of  Texas,  \vith  New  Mexico  and  California — in  all 
more  than  965,000  square  miles  of  territory. 


JAMES  MONROE 


THE  SOUTH  IN  OLDEN  DATS  97 

What  territory,  indeed,  has  ever  been  added  without 
Southern  brains  and  Southern  valor?  Of  George  Rogers 
Clark's  great  conquest  (1779),  we  have  already  spoken. 
The  purchase  of  Louisiana  by  President  Jefferson  (1803) 
more  than  doubled  the  area  of  the  Union.  The  same  presi- 
dent's sending  Lewis  and  Clark  to  explore  the  mouth  of 
the  Columbia  river  led  later  to  the  acquisition  of  Oregon 
territory.  Monroe  bought  Florida,  and  thus  greatly  ex- 
tended the  national  domain. 

It  is  a  well-known  principle  of  human  nature  that  men 
value  what  they  pay  for,  that  they  appreciate  what  they 
suffer  for.  So  the  South  loved  the  Union.  It  was  her 
Union,  the  Union  of  her  fathers,  freed  partly  by  the  heroism 
of  her  fathers,  enlarged  and  made  glorious  with  the  aid  of 
Southern  brawn  and  bravery.  That  she  should  love  this 
Union  was  natural ;  that  she  did  love  it  is  undeniable.  How 
can  she  ever  leave  it  ?  How  can  she  ever  fire  upon  the  flag 
which  her  Washington  first  flung  to  the  breeze,  and  which 
her  Key  sang  in  immortal  measures  ?  The  answer  is  writ- 
ten in  later  pages  of  this  volume.  In  self-defense,  she  drew 
the  sword  against  her  Northern  sisters.  Against  intolerable 
grievances,  she  protested  long  and  fruitlessly,  and  in  1861 
fought  for  the  constitution,  under  the  constitution,  and 
against  those  who  had  violated  the  solemn  guaranties  of 
that  constitution. 

"  'Tis  better  to  have  loved  and  lost 
Than  never  to  have  loved  at  all." 


98  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

CHAPTER  II 

THE  HOMES  THAT  MADE  HEROES 

I 

"Truth  Is  Mighty  and  Will  Prevail" 

IN  the  foregoing  chapter,  we  showed  how  our  fathers  re- 
sisted tyrants,  wrote  declarations,  maintained  them  on 
the  field  of  battle,  and  drafted  constitutions.  We  now 
turn  to  more  quiet  scenes.  In  this  chapter,  we  shall  see  them 
on  the  old  plantation,  and  in  the  family  circle.  We  shall 
watch  them  in  their  relations  to  the  slaves.  We  shall  refute 
the  slurs  heaped  upon  them  up  to  the  present  moment  by 
some  ill-informed  and  by  some  malicious  people.  We  shall 
learn  why  so  many  of  our  men  became  superb  cavalrymen 
both  in  the  Revolution  and  in  the  War  between  the  States. 
We  shall  see  the  father  in  the  family  circle,  with  his  sons 
around  him,  giving  them  ideals  of  honor  that  made  South- 
ern chivalry  a  phrase  of  glory  among  the  nations. 

Such  is  the  theme  of  this  chapter.  Phases  of  social  life 
not  bearing  upon  these  points,  we  shall  leave  to  the  maga- 
zine writer  and  the  novelist. 

This  old  Southern  civilization  has  never  been  understood, 
but  has  been  misrepresented,  maligned,  and  travestied.  The 
stage  has  caricatured  it.  Poets  have  prostituted  their  gifts 
to  vilify  it.  The  muse  of  history  has  been  degraded  from 


THE  HOMES  THAT  MADE  HEROES         99 

her  high  office  and  made  the  mouthpiece  of  the  traducer 
and  the  slanderer.  Fiction  has  lent  her  artful  and  seductive 
aid,  and  books,  unfair  and  disingenuous  if  not  purposely 
malicious,  have  made  the  Southern  planter's  name  a  byword 
and  a  hissing  among  the  nations;  while  children  in  schools 
where  the  Bible  was  lying  upon  the  table  as  the  standard  of 
life  and  of  morals  have  been  taught,  by  precept  and  by  pic- 
tures, that  a  planter  was  a  man  whose  daily  business  was  to 
maltreat  and  lash  the  negro.* 

Those  misrepresentations  have  been  sown  broadcast,  and 
borne  upon  the  winds  of  heaven.  The  books  that  contain 
them  are  still  found  by  thousands  in  private  and  public 
libraries  wherever  steam  can  carry  them,  and  have  been  read 
as  gospel  truth  by  men,  women,  and  children  among  all 
civilized  nations.  Oratory  could  not  catch  them.  States- 
manship could  not  refute  them.  They  went  into  the  home  of 
the  mechanic,  the  merchant,  the  lawyer,  the  scholar,  in  the 
Northern  and  Western  states,  and  in  Europe,  and  taught 
them  to  hate  and  despise  the  Southern  people ;  and  their 
specious  statements  cut  the  South  off  from  the  sympathy 
of  all  mankind. 

II 

The  South's  History  Written  By  Her  Enemies 

The  South  used  to  produce  statesmen  rather  than  writers. 
Nothing,  for  instance,  is  more  remarkable  than  the  vast  ar- 
ray of  legal  talent  shown  by  all  the  older  generations  of 


*This  refers  to  a  text-book  long  used  in  certain  schools;  it  defines  a  planter  and  illus- 
strates  by  a  picture  of  a  man  lashing  a  slave. 


100  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

Virginia.  The  bar  of  Richmond  was  formerly  made  up  al- 
most exclusively  of  men  that  would  have  graced  the  Su- 
preme Court  of  the  United  States  or  adorned  the  king's 
High  Court  of  Justice. 

Nearly  every  boy  of  promise  wished  to  be  a  lawyer.  Only 
thus  could  he  hope  for  political  honors;  and  political  pre- 
ferment was  the  goal  of  nearly  _  every  able  man's  ambition. 
If  success  came  at  the  bar,  it  led  him  into  prominence  as  a 
politician.  Politics  was  both  the  glory  and  the  bane  of  our 
civilization. 

Few  men  had  time  for  writing  books.  While  Southern 
orators  and  jurists  were  thrilling  listening  senates,  their 
enemies  were  writing  books  to  prejudice  the  world  against 
Southern  institutions. 

In  this  matter  the  enemies  of  the  South  got  fifty  years' 
start  of  her.  They  got  the  ear  of  the  North  and  of  all 
Europe,  and  did  her  an  incalculable  injury.  The  most 
that  she  can  do  now  is  to  write  the  true  story  of  her 
beautiful  old  civilization  in  essay,  in  fiction,  in  history,  and 
in  poetry,  so  that  her  own  children  and  all  others  that  care 
to  do  so  can  read  it  and  tell  it  to  those  that  are  willing  to 
listen. 

Though  most  of  her  ablest  men  went  into  politics,  the 
South  had  some  very  gifted  writers.  Her  facilities  for  publi- 
cation, however,  have  always  been  limited,  and  the  works  of 
her  writers  have  had  comparatively  little  circulation.  More- 
over, the  ear  of  the  North  was  poisoned,  and  Southern  books 
defending  the  South  were  but  little  heeded.  Such  men  as 
Thomas  R.  Dew,  N.  Beverley  Tucker,  and  Abel  P.Upshur, 


THE  HOMES  THAT  MADE  HEROES        101 

of  Virginia ;  William  Gilmore  Simms  and  Samuel  H.  Dick- 
son,  of  South  Carolina,  and  Bishop  Stephen  Elliott,  of 
Georgia,  wrote  ably  in  defense  of  Southern  institutions; 
but  their  words  fell  upon  unheeding  ears,  and  their  ink  was 
wasted.  De  Bozv's  Review  and  the  Southern  Literary  Mes- 
senger fought  a  brave  fight,  but  could  not  stem  the  tide  that 
had  set  in  against  the  South.  While  Uncle  Tom's  Cabin  sold 
by  the  million  and  was  translated  into  several  foreign  lan- 
guages, Aunt  Phillis's  Cabin,  an  able  reply  ^o  it  by  Mrs. 
Mary  H.  Eastman,  of  Virginia,  is  known  to  none  but  anti- 
quaries. 

In  this  connection,  let  us  quote  the  solemn  warning  of  the 
late  Dr.  J.  L.  M.  Curry,  an  eloquent  defender  of  his  people : 
"History,  poetry,  art,  public  opinion  have  been  most  unjust 
to  the  South.  By  perverse  reiterations  its  annals,  its  acts,  its 
inner  feelings,  its  purposes  have  been  grossly  misrepre- 
sented. History  as  written,  if  accepted  in  future  years,  will 
consign  the  South  to  infamy."  How  true  this  is  one  can  see 
every  time  he  turns  over  the  leaves  of  most  of  the  encyclo- 
pedias and  other  reference  books  in  our  libraries;  and  the 
poetry  of  America  is  so  filled  with  hostility  to  the  .South 
that  we  can  hardly  read  it  without  throwing  down  the  book 
in  anger. 

For  instance,  the  Encyclopedia  Britannica  says:  "Since 
the  revolutionary  days,  the  few  thinkers  of  America  born 
south  of  Mason  and  Dixon's  line  are  outnumbered  by  those 
belonging  to  the  single  state  of  Massachusetts ;  nor  is  it  too 
much  to  say  that,  mainly  by  their  connection  with  the  North, 
the  Carolinas  have  been  saved  from  sinking  to  the  level  of 


102  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

Mexico  and  the  Antilles."  This  slur  could  easily  be  refuted, 
but  the  scope  of  this  volume  does  not  permit  our  doing  it. 
The  Southern  teacher  and  the  Southern  student,  however, 
should  be  forewarned  as  to  all  such  books.  In  the  ponderous 
volumes  of  the  work  named  above,  we  find  all  kinds  of  ob- 
scure foreigners  and  obscure  Americans  of  other  sections 
glorified;  but  it  almost,  if  not  entirely,  ignores  John  Sevier 
and  Isaac  Shelby,  heroes  of  the  frontier;  Cornelius  Har- 
nett,  Richard  Caswell,  James  Iredell,  and  Nathaniel  Macon, 
heroes,  statesmen  and  jurists,  of  North  Carolina;  Peyton 
Randolph,  Edmund  Randolph,  George  Wythe,  William  C. 
Rives,  the  Tuckers,  and  Light  Horse  Harry  Lee,  eminent 
men  of  Virginia ;  William  R.  King  and  William  L.  Yancey, 
of  Alabama ;  William  Jasper  and  Richard  Henry  Wilde,  of 
Georgia;  William  Wirt  and  William  Pinckney,  of  Mary- 
land; King's  Mountain,  Guilford  Courthouse,  and  York- 
town  are  buried  in  oblivion;  and  a  reader  has  to  scour  the 
usual  English  editions  to  find  out  anything  about  General 
Daniel  H.  Morgan,  one  of  the  heroes  of  the  Revolution,  and 
J.  E.  B.  Stuart  and  N.  B.  Forrest,  two  of  the  greatest  cav- 
alry generals  of  the  English  race. 

An  air  of  contempt  for  the  South  pervades,  we  think,  the 
whole  of  this  encyclopedia.  After  implying,  in  the  pas- 
sage quoted,  that  after  the  Revolution,  the  South  sank  into 
insignificance,  it  goes  on  in  other  places  to  underrate  the 
most  eminent  men,  of  that  section.  Take  for  instance,  the 
statesmen  of  the  period  under  discussion.  The  three  men 
that  stood  preeminent  in  American  public  life  were  Clay, 
Calhoun,  and  Webster.  This  encyclopedia  gives  a  tolerably 


THE  HOMES  THAT  MADE  HEROES         103 

complete  outline  of  the  career  of  Daniel  Webster.  It  brings 
him  out  clearly  as  a  statesman  and  an  orator  of  command- 
ing ability.  Not  so  with  Henry  Clay  and  John  C.  Calhoun. 
No  one  would  imagine,  from  reading  the  meagre  sketches 
of  these  men,  that  they  too  commanded  the  applause  of  lis- 
tening senates,  solved  the  most  complicated  problems  of  in- 
ternational law,  and  became  the  idols  of  millions  of  their 
fellow-countrymen. 

To  see  such  men  as  Clay  and  Calhoun  almost  ignored  in 
a  great  encyclopedia  should  bring  every  American  to  his 
feet.  Who  in  the  old  ante-bellum  days  was  not  proud  of 
these  great  senators?  Clay,  Calhoun  and  Webster!  their 
names  were  always  grouped  together,  and  were  household 
words  in  America.  When  Clay  was  to  speak,  the  streets  and 
the  stores  of  Washington  were  deserted,  and  the  whole  city 
flocked  to  the  capitol  to  hear  that  rich,  sonorous  voice  rever- 
berate through  the  senate  chamber.  Of  Calhoun,  the  pro- 
found logican,  the  learned  statesman,  every  schoolboy  in  our 
country  is  proud.  These,  with  the  illustrious  Webster,  made 
the  American  senate  the  delight  and  the  wonder  of  two  con- 
tinents. Well  may  the  South  call  for  new  encyclopedias  to 
do  justice  to  such  sons ! 

Others  besides  the  Southern  people  have  suffered  from 
having  their  history  written  by  their  enemies.  No  man  has 
ever  been  more  caricatured  in  history  than  Oliver  Crom- 
well; no  soldiers  more  ridiculed  and  burlesqued  than  his 
praying  and  righting  warriors.  The  facts  are  easily  ex- 
plained: the  history  of  their  era  was  written  by  their  ene- 
mies, and  it  is  only  in  our  day  that  English  historians  are 


104  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

doing  the  Protector  and  his  soldiers  justice.  In  that  respect, 
the  heroes  of  the  South  have  fared  better  than  the  English- 
men in  question;  for  some  eminent  writers  of  the  North  now 
freely  admit  that  the  South  produced  far  greater  leaders 
than  the  North  in  the  war  of  secession,  and  many  Northern 
people  regard  Robert  E.  Lee  as  the  greatest  American  since 
Washington. 

Ill 
Tired  of  Hearing  Him  Called  "The  Just" 

A  special  object  of  hate  and  of  derision  was  the  so- 
called  "effete  aristocracy,"  played-out  aristocrats,  of  Vir- 
ginia. On  these,  the  stage,  the  novelist,  the  poet,  and 
the  historian  poured  the  vials  of  wrath  and  indignation. 
What  had  Virginia  done  ?  Why  all  this  venom  against  the 
most  ancient  of  the  commonwealths,  the  mother  of  states 
and  of  statesmen?  We  have  answered  the  question  in  ask- 
ing it:  She  was  the  oldest  of  the  commonwealths;  she  had 
produced  too  many  statesmen  and  presidents,  too  many 
great  soldiers  in  the  Revolution  and  in  later  wars  with  Eng- 
land and  with  Mexico.  It  was  the  old  story  of  Aristides  re- 
enacted  on  a  new  continent.  The  noblest  of  the  Greeks  was, 
you  remember,  stopped  one  day  in  the  market-place  by  a 
man  who  asked  him  to  write  the  name  of  Aristides  upon  his 
shell.  "Why,  my  good  fellow,"  said  Aristides,  "what  has 
Aristides  done  that  you  wish  to  ostracize  him?"  "Oh,  noth- 
ing, said  the  boor;  "but  I  am  tired  of  hearing  him  called 
'The  Just.'  " 

He  who  runs  may  read. 


THE  HOMES  THAT  MADE  HEROES         105 

This  "effete  aristocracy"  soon  proved  that  it  rwas  not 
effete.  At  Manassas  in  1 86 1,  it  furnished  a  Johnston  to  lead 
with  the  noble  Creole  of  Louisiana,  and  a  Stuart  to  ride  like 
a  Rupert  carrying  terror  and  dismay  among  the  invaders  of 
his  dear  Virginia.  A  little  later,  it  produced  a  Lee,  who,  in 
seven  days,  made  the  deeds  of  the  Confederate  soldier  read 
like  a  chapter  from  Caesar,  or  like  an  extract  from  the 
campaigns  of  Napoleon. 

On  the  stage,  the  Virginian  had  been  held  up  to  ridicule 
and  scorn.  In  fiction,  he  and  his  wife  and  daughter  had  been 
represented  as  vulgarians,  speaking  an  English  that  would 
stamp  them  in  any  drawing-room  of  the  North  or  of  Eu- 
rope as  ignoramuses  and  provincials.  Nothing  could  be  less 
true.  No  greater  misrepresentation  was  ever  uttered.  A 
good  many  old-fashioned  Virginians,  we  admit,  used  a  num- 
ber of  provincialisms  that  provoked  a  smile  in  other  sections 
of  the  country  and  even  from  their  own  children  and  grand- 
children ;  but,  on  the  other  hand,  nowhere  in  the  world  has 
better  and  purer  English  been  spoken  than  among  the  cul- 
tured classes  of  Virginia.  So  said  the  late  Prof.  George  F. 
Holmes  of  the  University  of  Virginia,  an  Englishman  of 
finished  culture,  and  Thackeray  and  Matthew  Arnold,  whose 
opinions  will  be  accepted  without  question. 

IV 

Culture  and  Refinement 

In  pronunciation,  we  will  admit,  the  Northern  people  are 
more  exact,  and  talk  more  "by  the  book;"  but  in  enun- 


106  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

ciation  and  intonation  the  South  is  far  superior.  Noth- 
ing is  more  musical  than  the  voice  of  a  Southern  woman  of 
culture  and  refinement. 

The  old  Southern  gentleman,  in  spite  of  an  occasional 
provincialism,  used  racy,  vigorous,  idiomatic  English.  If  he 
sometimes  drawled,  and  often  ignored  his  Ys,  he  did  not 
drop  'h's  out  of  his  'which',  'white,'  and  other  words  in  'wh/ 
nor  give  a  nasal  intonation  to  nearly  every  sentence. 

Culture  and  intelligence  pervaded  the  old  Southern  so- 
ciety. Grammarians  and  philologists  were  not  numerous; 
but  well-informed,  well-read  fnen  were  plentiful.  Home 
authors  were  not  always  encouraged;  but  the  standard  au- 
thors of  England  were  read  in  thousands  of  families.  Latin 
quotations  fell  from  their  lips  almost  unconsciously.  In  co- 
lonial days,  "as  Mr.  Pope  says,  sir,"  was  a  familiar  phrase; 
and,  in  recent  decades,  "Tennyson  has  well  put  it"  clinched 
many  an  argument.  The  old  tombstones  of  Virginia  would 
prove  that  Pope  was  a  household  poet. 

Private  libraries  were  very  numerous.  Nearly  every  fam- 
ily'of  position  had  several  hundred  volumes,  and  they  were 
not  kept  for  mere  appearance.  They  were  well  used  by  the 
purchaser,  and  went  on  a  long  visitation  around  the  neigh- 
borhood. The  whole  society  of  the  old  states  of  the  South 
was  characterized  by  intelligence  and  culture.  Questions  of 
the  day,  questions  of  tariff,  of  revenue,  of  slave  legislation, 
discussions  of  prominent  candidates  for  office,  the  latest  edi- 
torials of  the  leading  Whig  and  Democratic  papers — all 
came  up  at  the  table  and  in  the  general  sitting-room.  The 
father,  usually  a  planter,  would  discuss  all  public 'questions 


THE  HOMES  THAT  MADE  HEROES         107 

with  his  sons,  not  interfering  in  the  least  with  their  opinions. 
While  they  were  away  at  college,  he  would  correspond 
freely  with  them,  discussing  politics  and  politicians,  parties 
and  platforms.  The  sons  wrote  with  the  greatest  freedom. 
The  father  was  not  a  dictator  in  matters  of  opinion.  When 
the  war  between  the  North  and  the  South  was  brewing,  Col. 
R.  E.  Lee  did  not  attempt  to  dictate  the  action  of  his  sons. 

The  average  of  intelligence  among  Southern  men  was 
high.  The  great  mass  of  citizens  had  well-formed  opinions 
on  public  questions,  and  could  express  them  forcibly.  A 
churchyard  on  Sunday  before  and  after '  "service"  or 
"preaching,"  or  a  court  green  on  "court  day,"  heard  ani- 
mated discussions  of  many  burning  questions.  The  South- 
ern man  is  a  born  politician.  He  can  still  discuss  questions 
of  the  day,  and  his  horse  sense  is  often  more  useful  to  the 
state  than  the  greater  book  learning  of  some  other  Ameri- 
cans. 

Nor  were  schools  and  colleges  neglected.  A '  thoughtful 
writer*  says  that  in  1850  the  South  sent  eight  boys  to 
school  or  college  where  the  North  sent  five.  In  the  "olden 
days,"  the  South,  while  employing  numberless  tutors  for 
her  sons,  sent  a  great  many  young  men  to  Northern  col- 
leges, such  as  Princeton,  Yale,  and  Harvard.  A  few  went  to 
William  and  Mary.  After  the  opening  of  the  University  of 
Virginia,  the  poor  boys  of  Virginia  flocked  there.  Later,  it 
became  more  of  a  rich  man's  school,  and  its  master's  degree 
became  the  highest  academic  honor  on  this  continent.  More- 
over, the  "honor  system,"  born  at  William  and  Mary,  early 

*Rev.  J.  M.  Hawley. 


108  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

took  root  at  the  University  of  Virginia.  The  ideal  of  abso- 
lute fairness  and  integrity  fostered  in  Southern  colleges  was 
the  Southern  honor  system  in  miniature,  and  has  survived 
to  a  large  degree  to  the  present  moment.  It  has  both  the 
virtues  and  the  defects  of  the  old  Southern  honor  system. 
While  not  tolerating  cheating,  it  too  often  permits  idleness 
and  shiftlessness.  While  demanding  that  students  be  first  of 
all  gentlemen,  it  too  often  winks  at  so-called  "gentlemanly 
vices."  We  must  admit,  furthermore,  that  the  college  honor 
system  is  still  very  defective,  and  encourages  things  which, 
if  done  by  a  young  man  after  leaving  college,  might  soon 
land  him  in  the  penitentiary.  The  foundation,  however,  is 
solid,  and  should  be  used  by  us  as  the  basis  of  a  noble  man- 
hood. In  spite  of  its  defects,  it  is,  we  believe,  far  superior 
to  the  code  of  college  honor  prevailing  in  some  other  sections 
of  our  country. 

V 

Manliness  and  Self-Reliance 

The  whole  trend  of  education  was  to  develop  manly 
self-reliance  and  independence.  The  honor  system,  as 
established  in  Virginia  colleges  and  prevailing  all  through 
the  South,  was  in  thorough  harmony  with  the  train- 
ing of  the  Southern  home.  While  carousing  and  playing 
cards  for  money  were  sometimes  regarded  as  rather  gentle- 
manly accomplishments,  to  tell  a  lie,  to  cheat  on  an  examina- 
tion, to  cheat  at  a  game  of  cards — these  damned  a  young 
man  beyond  all  redemption.  At  home,  he  had  been  taught  to 
despise  a  liar ;  and  a  man  who  got  anything  under  false  pre- 


THE  HOMES  THAT  MADE  HEROES         109 

tenses  was  regarded  as  a  liar,  and  despised  accordingly.  The 
Southern  youth,  like  the  Persian,  were  taught  "to  ride,  and 
to  tell  the  truth." 

The  same  honor  system  kept  politics  from  being,  as  it 
is  now  called,  "a  dirty  business."  Bribery  was  practically 
unheard  of.  A  gentleman  could  run  for  office  without  being 
asked  or  expected  to  use  any  money  except  the  cost  of  print- 
ing circulars  or  "dodgers,"  paying  his  traveling  expenses, 
and  publishing  notices  in  the  local  papers.  Says  the  late  Dr. 
J.  L.  M.  Curry,  in  this  connection :  "Bribery  and  corruption 
in  elections,  when  it  occurred,  made  the  place  and  persons  a 
byword  and  a  scorn." 

Society  was  pure  and  elevating  in  its  tone.  Truth,  cour- 
age, and  honor  were  required  of  the  men,  and  were  their 
usual  characteristics.  Of  the  women,  absolute  purity  was  de- 
manded, and  no  purer  women  ever  became  the  mothers  of 
heroes.  Certain  weaknesses  and  so-called  gentlemanly  vices 
might  be  tolerated  in  the  men — especially  drinking,  play- 
ing cards,  and  dicing — but  the  women  were  like  Caesar's 
wife,  above  reproach.  Nor  was  this  confined  to  the  higher 
classes. 

On  the  point-of-honor,  the  Southern  gentleman  was  scru- 
pulously strict.  So  were  the  generations  before  him.  The 
old  Southern  Cavalier  has  been  ridiculed  for  his  testy  ad- 
herence to  the  point-of-honor,  and  much  abuse  has  been 
lavished  upon  him.  No  doubt  he  had  his  faults;  but  he 
transmitted  to  his  sons  a  sacred  regard  for  truth,  a  chivalrous 
regard  for  women,  fidelity  to  his  friends,  and  a  willingness 
to  die  for  any  righteous  and  noble  cause  that  enlisted  his 


110  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

sympathy  and  won  his  devotion.  From  such  men,  great  civi- 
lizations may  spring  to  enrich  humanity. 

A  gentleman's  word  could  not  be  questioned.  The  mere 
suggestion  of  "lie"  or  of  "prevarication"  would  not  be  tol- 
erated. Suit  for  damages  was  not  brought  inside  of  a  court 
room,  but  in  a  field  near  by,  with  swords,  or  with  "pistols 
and  coffee."  Even  this  so-called  field-of-honor,  however, 
was  but  an  exaggeration  of  a  great  idea — the  idea  that 
honor  is  the  greatest  thing  of  all,  and  that  life  without  honor 
is  not  worth  living. 

No  Spartan  mother  ever  trained  soldiers  more  superbly 
than  the  Southern  home.  In  the  Revolutionary  War,  South- 
ern troops  rarely  deserted  their  colors.  In  the  War  with 
Mexico,  no  Southern  regiment  disgraced  itself.  In  the  War 
between  the  States,  the  Spartan  idea  kept  thousands  of 
Southern  men  at  the  front  long  after  they  had  lost  all  hope 
of  independence.  A  gentleman  could  not  afford  to  desert. 
Some  men  with  nothing  to  lose  did  desert,  and  are  pointed 
at  to-day  with  the  finger  of  scorn. 

This  high  sense  of  honor  was  instilled  into  the  boy  from 
his  very  cradle.  Along  with  this,  he  was  taught  to  be  self- 
reliant,  manly.  He  was  taught  to  think  as  a  man,  to  act  as  a 
man,  to  be  a  man.  When  the  great  controversy  between 
North  and  South  waxed  hot,  every  young  man  in  the  South 
had  his  opinion,  and  expressed  it  freely.  When  war  seemed 
inevitable,  each  one  asked  himself  the  question,  "What  am  I 
going  to  do  about  it?"  and  he  answered  it  with  his  musket. 
He  fought,  not  as  a  part  of  a  great  engine  of  destruction, 
but  as  an  individual,  as  a  citizen  whose  every  blow  helped 


THE  HOMES  THAT  MADE  HEROES        111 

to  free  his  people  from  the  invader.  This  individualism 
made!  him  a  superb  fighter,  though  it  sometimes  interfered 
with  his  efficiency  as  a  soldier.  So  was  it  with  his  sires  of 
the  Revolution. 

VI 

"Ole  Marstet " 

No  civilization  has  ever  been  more  misunderstood  than 
that  of  the  ante-bellum  South.  Even  some  of  our  own 
people  have  unintentionally  misrepresented  it;  while  our 
enemies  have  caricatured  and  maligned  it.  The  object 
of  this  chapter  is  to  steer  between  these  two  extremes  and 
tell  the  truth. 

Some  Southern  writers  have  treated  the  life  of  the  old 
Southern  planter  as  a  beautiful  dream,  or  a  realm  of  ely- 
sium;  others,  as  an  ideal  of  social  and  domestic  bliss. 
Neither  of  these  views  is  the  correct  one. 

Enemies  in  America  and  in  Europe  have  painted  the  ante- 
bellum  South  as  a  land  of  oriental  ease  and  luxury,  where 
the  planter  led  a  life  of  effeminacy  and  indolence,  such  as  we 
read  of  in  stories  of  the  Persian  kings  and  nobles,  the 
planter  reclining  lazily  on  richly-embroidered  divans  and  at- 
tended by  retinues  of  trembling  slaves,  who  fanned  the 
haughty  despot  as  he  lay  on  his  downy  couch,  and  expected 
him  at  any  moment  to  order  them  to  execution.  This  is  as 
true  as  the  tales  of  the  Arabian  Nights  or  as  the  stories  ofj 
Baron  Munchausen. 


112  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

The  planter's  life  was  neither  a  beautiful  dream  .nor  an 
ideal  of  social  and  domestic  bliss.  It  had  its  beautiful,  its 
charming  features;  and  its  social  and  domestic  joys  were 
many.  It  had  some  charms  which  can  never  be  adequately 
described  and  which  can  never  be  seen  again  forever.  It  had 
also  its  shadows,  its  burdens,  its  responsibilities;  and  these 
shadows  were  so  dark,  and  the  burdens  and  responsibilities 
so  heavy,  as  to  preclude  the  idea  of  its  being  an  "ideal  of 
social  and  domestic  bliss."  Moreover,  there  were  too  many 
stern  realities  connected  with  it  to  permit  us  to  regard  it  as 
a  dream  of  any  character.  Furthermore,  the  responsibility 
of  owning  and  of  caring  for  so  many  human  beings  weighed 
heavily  upon  the  planter  and  his  family,  so  that  emancipa- 
tion was  a  glad  relief  to  many. 

A  planter,  in  short,  was  a  very  real  and  a  very  practical 
man  of  business,  a  man  of  affairs,  wide-awake,  intelligently 
busy.  To  get  food  and  clothing  for  his  family  and  his  ser- 
vants, he  must  exercise  the  same  habits  of  industry,  watch- 
fulness, and  thrift  that  are  required  of  business  men  in  other 
callings.  If  he  did  not  get  up  at  daybreak,  he  had  employees 
who  were  paid  to  do  so  for  him ;  and  he  was  out  on  his  plan- 
tation earlier  than  most  of  the  business  and  professional 
men  of  our  money-making  cities. 

He  kept  his  eye  on  the  grain  market,  the  tobacco  market, 
and  the  cotton  market.  He  studied  his  soil,  knew  the  pro- 
ducing power  of  every  field,  exchanged  ideas  with  his  neigh- 
bors, and  developed  a  wonderful  sagacity.  He  led  an  earn- 
est and  "strenuous"  life,  but  kept  himself  well  and  hearty 
by  joining  in  the  sports  and  diversions  of  his  family.  In 


THE  HOMES  THAT  MADE  HEROES         113 

whist,  chess  and  backgammon,  he  was  an  expert,  could  lead 
a  pretty  girl  handsomely  in  the  Virginia  reel,  and  was  so 
full  of  "wise  saws  and  modern  instances"  that  young  people 
often  preferred  to  listen  to  his  conversation  rather  than 
steal  out  on  the  porch  and  talk  slang  and  nonsense  to  one 
another. 

The  great  rendezvous  were  the  stores  and  the  churches. 
A  country  store  was  a  sort  of  academy.  There  the  planters 
met  in  groups — accidentally  on  purpose,  as  it  were — and 
discussed  the  latest  news,  the  questions  of  the  day,  the  tariff, 
the  slavery  agitation,  the  last  debate  in  Congress,  and  with 
great  intelligence  and  discrimination  exchanged  opinions, 
and  assessed  the  abilities  of  politicians  and  of  statesmen.  At 
church,  before  and  after  service  or  "preaching,"  the  same 
scene  was  enacted. 

A  plantation  was  a  veritable  beehive.  In  many  cases,  the 
only  drones  were  some  negro  slaves  who  would  not  work 
and  who  had  such  a  bad  reputation  that  no  one  would  buy 
them,  or  some  who  were  too  old  to  work  and  were  cared  for 
by  the  master. 

Idle  planters  there  of  course  were.  A  good  many  wealthy 
men  led  very  easy  lives,  and  left  most  of  the  work  to  over- 
seers and  managers.  But  the  statements  made  in  the  fore- 
going paragraphs  of  this  chapter  apply  to  untold  thousands 
of  men  that  had  to  work  for  a  competent  support  for  them- 
selves, their  families,  and  their  dependents. 

"Ole  Marster's"  sons  inherited  his  business  capacity.  Be- 
ing constantly  thrown  with  inferiors,  they  learned  the 
habit  of  command,  of  leadership.  These  facts  help  to  ac- 
8 


114  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

count  for  the  preeminence  of  the  South  in  statesmanship 
and  on  the  field  of  battle.  On  the  other  hand,  the  man  that 
is  thrown  with  inferiors  continually  is  apt  to  become  self- 
opinionated  and  dictatorial,  even  proud  and  arrogant.  So 
was  it  quite  frequently  with  the  colonial  Cavalier  and  his 
descendants,  and  with  others  of  less  noble  lineage.  Pride 
and  haughtiness  led  to  quarrelling  and  duelling.  Duelling 
brought  censure  and  even  contempt.  The  whole  generation 
of  "first  families"  were  ridiculed  and  hated  in  some  quar- 
ters, and  so  the  "root  of  bitterness"  troubled  the  nation. 

VII 
"Ole  Mistis" 

The  busiest  body  on  the  whole  plantation  was  the 
"Missis,"  or  "Ole  Missis,"  or  "Ole  Mistis,"  as  the  ser- 
vants called  her.  Busy?  Yes,  busy  to  the  very  elbows. 
Busy  does  not  express  it.  No,  busy  is  a  trifling,  i  npecunious 
word  when  applied  to  "Ole  Missis."  Busier  than  "Ole  Mars- 
ter ;"  for,  if  his  "work  was  from  sun  to  sun,  her  work  was 
never  done."  Busier  than  "Mammy ;"  for,  after  the  children 
were  all  asleep,  she  could  go  to  bed  and  sleep  all  night,  un- 
less one  of  the  children  had  the  croup  or  a  spasm.  Busier 
than  "Uncle  Joe,"  "Uncle  Henry"  and  the  rest  of  the 
trusted  field-hands ;  for  they  sat  by  the  fire  dozing  and 
smoking  and  praying  and  humming  hymn-tunes,  while 
"Ole  Missis"  was  busy  with  a  thousand  and  one  things  that 
had  to  be  attended  to  before  the  house  and  the  "quarters" 


THE  HOMES  THAT  MADE  HEROES         115 

and  the  cows  and  the  pigs  and  the  chickens  could  settle 
themselves  down  for  a  good  night's  rest. 

"Ole  Marster"  might  know  something;  but  "Ole  Mistis" 
knew' everything  in  heaven  above  and  in  the  earth  beneath 
and  in  the  waters  under  the  earth.  From  her  opinion  there 
was  no  shadow  of  dissent.  Her  decision  on  any  point  was 
absolutely  final,  more  infallible  than  the  pope's,  more  bind- 
ing than  that  of  any  of  the  great  councils  of  Christendom. 
In  the  dressing,  basting,  and  roasting  of  a  turkey,  her 
opinion  was  law.  On  mince-meat  and  pastry,  she  had  a 
patent,  left  to  her  by  her  mother  and  inherited  by  her  from 
bygone  generations.  As  to  how  many  eggs  a  pullet  or  an  old 
hen  ought  to  lay  at  such  a  season,  her  opinion  was  quoted 
all  over  the  plantation  with  as  much  awe  as  a  text  of  Scrip- 
ture. 

She  was  the  genius  loci,  the  goddess,  or  rather  the  queen 
of  this  little  kingdom.  Tn  the  domestic  department,  she  was 
supreme,  her  husband  being  only  Prince  Consort,  with  no 
voice  in  the  government.  Her  executive  ability  was  equal 
to  her  husband's.  They  were  like  two  monarchs  living  in 
the  same  palace,  but  ruling  different  kingdoms.  He  might 
call  upon  her  to  share  the  burdens  of  his  administration, 
and  even  leave  many  matters  to  her  decision ;  but  he  would 
not  dream  of  interfering  with  her  right  of  eminent  domain 
in  the  culinary  and  domestic  department.  Thus  she  became 
a  veritable  statesman.  She  had  the  masculine  abilities  of  an 
Elizabeth  combined  with  the  feminine  graces  of  a  Victoria. 

From  both  parents,  therefore,  the  children  inherited  exec- 
utive ability,  a  talent  for  administration.  The  girls,  too,  were 


116  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

trained  by  the  mother  to  assist  in  the  affairs  of  state.  The 
sons  acquired  habits  of  command,  caught  their  father's 
methods,  and  learned  to  wield  authority.  Thus  the  daugh- 
ters were  fitted  to  become  the  queens  of  some  younger  plant- 
ers, and  the  sons  were  equipped  for  writing  constitutions, 
guiding  cabinets  and  congresses,  and  leading  armies  on  the 
field  of  battle. 

VIII 

The  Planter  Civilization 

This  activity  on  the  lazy  old  plantation  may  be  news 
to  some  readers.  Let  us  supplement  our  statements  with 
facts  given  by  the  late  Henry  W.  Grady :  "In  material  as 
in  political  affairs,  the  old  South  was  masterful.  The  first 
important  railroad  operated  in  America  traversed  Carolina. 
The  first  steamer  that  crossed  the  ocean  cleared  from 
Savannah.  The  first  college  established  for  girls  was 
opened  in  Georgia.  No  naturalist  has  surpassed  Audubon : 
no  geographer  equalled  Maury;  and  Sims  and  McDonald 
led  the  world  of  surgery  in  their  respective  lines.  It  was 
Crawford  Long,  of  Georgia,  who  gave  to  the  world  the 

priceless  blessing  of  anaesthesia 

Though  it  is  held  that  slavery  enriched  the  few  at  the  gen- 
eral expense,  Georgia  and  Carolina  were  the  richest  states, 
per  capita,  in  the  Union  in  1860,  saving  Rhode  Island." 

These  facts  are  stubborn,  and  refute  the  charge  of  in- 
dolence and  effeminacy.  If  mathematical  facts  will  weigh 
more  with  some  readers,  however,  let  us  give  them  a  few 
statistics.  The  census  of  1850  shows  that  in  that  year  there 


THE  HOMES   THAT  MADE  HEROES  117 

were  as  many  Southern  whites  as  Northern  engaged  in 
laborious  occupations.  Between  1850  and  1860,  the  South, 
with  only  one-fourth  of  the  white  population,  built  2,850 
miles  more  of  railroad  than  the  New  England  and  Middle 
States,  her  rate  of  increase  in  the  ten  years  being  400  per 
cent;  theirs,  100  per  cent.  In  the  same  period  of  ten  years, 
she  made  24  per  cent  increase  in  manufacturing  flour  and 
meal;  about  35  per  cent  increase  in  manufacturing  lumber; 
in  steam  engines  and  machinery,  gained  over  200  per  cent, 
while  the  rest  of  the  country  gained  40  per  cent;  in  cotton 
manufacturing,  gained  $1,000,000  in  the  ten  years. 

Is  this  indolence  and  thrif tlessness  ? 

Again:  the  South,  in  1850,  had  30  per  cent  of  the  bank- 
ing capital  of  the  country ;  44  per  cent  of  the  assessed  prop- 
erty of  the  United  States ;  45  per  cent  of  the  live  stock ;  she 
grew  over  half  the  total  corn  crop;  had  56  per  cent  of  the 
hogs  and  sheep.  Besides  producing  all  the  cotton,  sugar, 
rice,  and  molasses,  she  raised  more  than  half  of  all  the  agri- 
cultural products.  She  slaughtered  33  per  cent  of  all  the 
animals  killed.  She  did  67  per  cent  of  the  home  manufac- 
turing, owned  one-third  of  the  farm  values,  and  increased 
their  assessed  value  more  than  $1,300,000  in  the  decade  be- 
tween 1850  and  1860.  The  South  was  richer  per  capita, 
including  slaves,  who  owned  no  property,  than  New  Eng- 
land and  the  Middle  States.* 

So  much  for  the  mathematical  and  statistical  argument. 
We,  however,  prefer  the  physiological  and  ethical  argument, 
the  "like-begets-like"  theory  of  the  subject.  After  water 


*For  most  of  these  statistics,  we  are  indebted  to  the  valuable  article  of  Gen.  Stephen 
D.  Lee,  in  the  "Confederate  Military  History,"  Vol.  XII. 


118  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

rises  above  its  level,  after  the  pygmies  of  Lilliput  produce  the 
giants  of  Brobdingnag,  and  after  men  learn  to  gather  grapes 
from  thorns  and  figs  from  thistles,  we  may  begin  to  believe 
that  the  heroes  and  the  constitution-builders  of  the  South 
are  sprung  from  "butterflies  of  aristocracy." 

"Look  unto  the  rock  whence  ye  are  hewn/'  was  said  to 
them  of  old,  ages  ago.  For  us  to-day,  it  is  none  the  less 
wholesome  counsel.  We  of  the  South  are  sprung  from  a 
race  which  providence  seems  to  have  chosen  as  the  great 
torchbearers  of  civilization  in  the  modern  centuries.  The 
great  Anglo-Saxon  race  which  settled  the  commonwealths 
of  the  South  has,  in  a  most  marked  degree,  the  capacity  for 
civilization,  and,  since  it  stepped  upon  the  arena  of  history, 
has  never  failed  to  produce  leaders  to  meet  the  great  crises 
of  the  ages.  Egbert,  Edgar,  and  Alfred  the  Great,  in  the 
Anglo-Saxon  era;  Henry  the  Second,  the  first  and  third  Ed- 
wards in  the  Middle  Ages;  Henry  the  Seventh,  Elizabeth, 
Washington,  and  Lee  in  the  modern  era — such  men  this  race 
produces  as  they  are  needed.  Put  the  Anglo-Saxon  on  an 
island  in  the  sea,  and  he  will  soon  write  a  constitution  and 
build  a  commonwealth. 

From  this  sturdy,  potential  stock,  sprang  the  founders  of 
Virginia,  of  Georgia,  and  of  the  Carolinas.  Engraft  upon 
this  a  twig  of  the  Scotch-Irish,  German,  and  Huguenot  stock 
— men  who,  like  the  Anglo-Saxon,  know  how  to  suffer  and 
be  strong — and  you  have  a  race  with  an  inborn  love  of  free- 
dom and  a  hatred  of  tyranny,  a  race  that  will  plant  com- 
monwealths to  stand  forever. 

The  man  of  this  race  has  the  leaven  that  leaveneth  the 
whole  lump.  He  bears  within  him  the  fermenting  power 


-   THE  HOMES  THAT  MADE  HEROES         119 

that  buoys  him  up  with  a  mighty  frenzy,  with  an  insatiable 
desire  to  go  and  tell  all  men  the  great  message  committed  to 
his  keeping.  He  will  strike  into  the  pathless  desert,  drive 
the  panther  from  his  covert,  and  expel  the  native  denizens 
of  the  forest.  A  born  ruler  and  organizer,  nothing  can  stay 
his  progress.  Difficulties  but  whet  his  courage ;  obstacles  but 
speed  his  march.  Of  the  fathers  of  the  South,  all  this  is 
eminently  true.  Struggles  with  the  Indian  on  the  frontier, 
grim  contests  with  jealous  neighbors,  fierce  grapplings  with 
the  powers  of  nature  yielding  reluctantly  to  axe  and  hammer 
* — all  but  tried  his  metal  and  trained  his  muscle. 

IX 
The  Cavalier  and  the  Puritan 

In  the  settlement  of  the  old  Southern  commonwealths, 
the  Cavalier  element  was  prominent.  That  all  the  people 
of  the  South  are  sprung  from  the  gentle  classes  of  Eng- 
land is  claimed  by  no  sane  person;  but  we  may  say  that 
many  old  families  of  the  Southern  states  are  of  Cavalier 
ancestry. 

And  never  have  men  been  more  caricatured  and  misrep- 
resented than  these  Cavalier  forefathers.  Even  some  of  our 
Southern  writers  have  dubbed  them  "butterflies  of  aris- 
tocracy," and  have  thus  played  into  the  hands  of  our  tra- 
ducers.  Many  histories  represent  the  "Pilgrim  Fathers"  of 
New  England  as  a  band  of  self-sacrificing  missionaries  leav- 
ing comfortable  homes  in  England  to  christianize  the  sav- 
ages of  the  American  wilderness,  and  treat  the  early  set- 


120  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

tiers  of  Virginia  as  idle  adventurers  coming  to  a  new 
world  to  see  the  sights,  and  recoup  their  shattered  fortunes 
by  shipping  turkeys  and  bogus  gold  dust  to  expectant  mul- 
titudes in  England.  Both  statements  are  untrue  and  pre- 
posterous. 

The  original  settlers  of  Plymouth  went  from  England  to 
Holland,  and  came  from  Holland  to  America.  In  leaving 
England,  they  were  refugeeing  from  royal  tyranny  and 
priestly  despotism.  After  living  in  Holland  a  while,  they 
found  that  their  children  were  becoming  weaned  away  from 
the  customs  and  the  language  of  the  mother-country,  and 
becoming  tainted  by  the  vices  of  the  continent,  and  they 
realized  that  they  themselves,  the  older  generation,  were  at 
a  great  disadvantage  in  trying  at  their  age  to  learn  a  new 
language,  and  to  establish  themselves  in  a  new  country 
where  all  avenues  to  prosperity  were  already  crowded.  Nat- 
urally, then,  they  looked  towards  the  new  colonies  of  Eng- 
land. In  the  virgin  forests  of  America,  they  might  breathe 
the  air  of  freedom,  worship  as  they  pleased,  and  ship  their 
surplus  produce  to  the  mother-country.*  When  opportunity 
offered,  they  would  try  to  convert  the  Indians  to  Christ- 
ianity. 

These  Puritans  of  New  England  were  a  brave,  noble,  in- 
domitable people.  During  the  era  of  Stuart  tyranny,  their 
numbers  were  greatly  increased  by  immigration;  they,  too, 
hated  tyranny  and  loved  freedom. 

After  the  overthrow  of  Charles  I  and  his  party,  many 
Cavaliers  flocked  to  Virginia.  Between  1650  and  1670,  the 


"Lectures  of  the  late  Prof.  Herbert  B.  Adams. 


THE  HOMES  THAT  MADE  HEROES         121 

population  of  Virginia  increased  from  15,000  to  40,000. 
From  some  of  these  Cavaliers  afterwards  sprang  George 
Washington,  George  Mason,  the  Lees,  the  Randolphs,  Ed- 
mund Pendleton,  James  Madison,  James  Monroe,  and 
other  great  patriots  of  America.  These  "butterflies  of  aris- 
tocracy" produced  a  race  of  giants. 

Never  has  man  been  more  travestied  than  the  Cavalier. 
Because  he  wore  a  satin  doublet,  a  slashed  waistcoat,  ruffles, 
and  powdered  his  hair,  he  has  been  represented  as  a  trifler 
and  an  adventurer,  though  under  his  slashed  waistcoat 
there  beat  a  loyal  and  noble  heart,  true  to  king  and  country ; 
and  though  in  the  service  of  both — according  tq  his  views 
of  duty — he  fought  brilliantly  under  Rupert,  Bacon,  Wash- 
ington, and  Lee.  As  a  religionist,  the  Cavalier  was,  we  ad- 
mit, not  as  zealous  as  the  Puritan.  He  loved  his  church, 
and  would  fight  for  it  bravely  and  bitterly.  In  the  details 
of  Christian  living,  the  sincere  Puritan  was  no  doubt  su- 
perior; but  the  Puritan  system,  by  adopting  religion  as  a 
badge  of  office  and  as  an  avenue  to  social  importance,  put 
a  premium  upon  hypocrisy,  so  that  the  class  of  men  always 
despised  in  the  South  often  rose  to  prominence  in  other 
sections.  This  sad  fact,  the  genius  of  Hawthorne  has  her- 
alded to  unborn  generations. 

Both  Puritan  and  Cavalier  have  much  to  be  proud  of. 
Both  have  a  noble  history.  Both  migrated  to  America,  to 
escape  tyranny  and  to  breathe  the  air  of  freedom.  Unfortu- 
nately, however,  they  brought  their  animosities  with  them, 
and  on  this  new  soil  nursed  the  old  grudge  to  keep  it  warm. 

Neither  by  himself  can  make  an  ideal  nation;  the  two 


122  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

united  can  build  an  eternal  commonwealth.  In  the  blending 
of  these  two  noble  strains  of  blood  lies  the  secret  of  our 
future  greatness.  The  Puritan  has  the  solidity,  the  stolidity, 
the  seriousness,  yes,  even  the  moroseness  of  the  Anglo- 
Saxon  ;  the  Cavalier  has  the  buoyancy,  the  hopefulness,  the 
vivacity  of  the  Norman.  Both  have  an  inborn  love  of  free- 
dom, a  sense  of  fair-play,  and  a  hatred  of  tyranny.  The  two 
together  could  produce  a  people  like  that  which  gave  jury 
trial  to  the  world,  and  conquered  the  French  nobility  at 
Crecy,  Poitiers,  and  Agincourt. 

In  the  olden  days,  the  sections  as  a  whole  did  not  know 
each  other,  though  our  statesmen,  as  already  seen,  met,  de- 
liberated together,  and  honored  one  another.  It  is  time  the 
past  were  dead  and  buried;  but,  before  that  can  come  to 
pass,  there  must  be  apology  and  reparation  for  insults  and 
injuries  inflicted.  The  dead — they  shall  arise  at  the  last 
trump;  we  cannot  bring  them  to  life  again;  but  we  can  fol- 
low Zaccheus,*  the  small  of  stature  and  the  exceeding  great 
of  soul,  who  said,  "If  I  have  wronged  any  man,  I  will  re- 
store to  him  fourfold."  Such  apology  and  reparation  is 
both  manly  and  divine;  who  will  make  it? 

There  are  signs  of  a  better  day.  The  light  is  even  now 
breaking  in  the  east.  A  Massachusetts  senatort  has  said  in 
print  that,  at  the  formation  of  the  Union,  "each  and  every 
state  had  the  right  peaceably  to  withdraw."  Another  Mas- 
sachusetts leaderj  has  said,  more  recently,  that  in  the  great 
war,  "both  sides  were  right."  Mr.  Roosevelt,  some  years 

*See  Luke  19  :  2-8. 
•fHenry  Cabot  Lodge. 
^Charles  Francis  Adams. 


THE  HOMES  THAT  MADE  HEROES         123 

ago,  said  that  the  Southern  soldiers  were  superior  to  the 
Northern,  and  that  Lee  was  a  greater  soldier  than  Grant. 
Mr.  Cleveland  has  very  recently  declared  that  the  South 
alone  can  solve  the  race  problem.  Prominent  men  and  lead- 
ing journals  are  endorsing  some  or  all  of  these  statements, 
more  or  less  vindicating  the  South's  opinions  and  actions. 

These  are  all  hopeful  signs,  and  an  "era  of  good  feeling" 
may  be  drawing  near.  Zaccheus  is  up  the  tree,  and  he  will, 
we  hope,  soon  come  down  and  utter  the  noble  words  quoted 
in  an  earlier  paragraph. 

X 

The  Yeomanry  of  the  South 

The  Cavalier  element  gave  tone  and  elegance  to  South- 
ern society.  Below  it  in  the  social  scale,  but  not  sep- 
arated by  any  impassable  line  and  not  in  any  cring- 
ing subjection  to  it,  was  the  sturdy  yeoman  class, 
men  of  brains  and  of  manly  independence,  who  followed 
the  Cavaliers  against  Berkeley,  against  George  III,  and, 
later  still,  against  the  encroachments  and  the  invasion  of 
former  friends  turned  into  enemies.  In  all  these  crises,  this 
sturdy  class  have  proved  themselves  worthy  sons  of  the  yeo- 
manry of  England.  Both  the  Cavalier  and  the  yeoman  of 
the  South  have  always  known  their  rights  and,  knowing, 
dared  maintain,  and  have  taught,  and  still  teach,  their  sons 
to  face  the  tyrant,  whether  priest  or  potentate,  king  or  cabi- 
net. 

The  yeoman  of  the  South  has  never  been  despised  be- 
cause he  was  a  yeoman.  From  this  stock  have  sprung  many 


124  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

of  the  greatest  soldiers  and  statesmen  of  the  South,  men 
whose  names  are  household  words  from  the  Potomac  to  the 
Rio  Grande. 

Between  the  classes  of  society  no  hard  and  fast  line  has 
ever  been  drawn  in  the  states  south  of  the  Potomac.  Ability 
and  genius,  if  united  to  character  and  gentility,  have  always 
been  honored  even  in  much  maligned  Virginia  and  South 
Carolina. 

On  no  other  point  has  so  much  stuff  and  nonsense  been 
said  and  written.  This  or  that  city  has  been  held  up  to  scorn 
and  ridicule  for  not  admitting  such  and  such  a  man  into  its 
elite  society.  In  these  charges,  there  is  usually  no  scintilla 
of  real  truth.  If  an  eminent  self-made  statesman,  littera- 
teur, or  soldier  has  been  coldly  treated  by  any  Southern  com- 
munity, it  can  be  easily  found  out,  on  a  quiet  investigation, 
that  there  was  some  good  and  sufficient  reason — something 
that  would  cause  him  to  be  coldly  received  by  good  and  pure 
people  of  other  sections. 

Most  of  the  talk  about  the  haughty  old  aristocrats  of  Vir- 
ginia is  utterly  without  foundation.  In  Williamsburg,  for 
instance,  long  famous  as  a  centre  of  elegant  culture  and  of 
the  most  refined  society,  there  were  the  most  pleasant  re- 
lations between  the  classes.  A  respectable  mechanic  was  on 
the  most  cordial  terms  with  gentlemen  of  the  best  birth  and 
breeding.  The  old  Virginia  gentleman  "hobnobbed"  with 
his  more  humble  neighbors,  and  assumed  no  airs  of  super- 
iority. In  Virginia  to-day  the  same  state  of  affairs  exists. 
A  gentleman,  sure  of  his  position,  is  neither  too  proud  nor 
afraid  to  be  on  the  most  pleasant  relations  with  neighbors 


THE  HOMES  THAT  MADE  HEROES         125 

who  move  in  spheres  of  society  lower  than  himself.  A  few 
snobs  look  down  upon  honest  workingmen,  and  assume  an 
air  and  a  tone  of  superiority;  but  they  are  soon  labeled  by 
all  classes  as  "poor  white  trash"  who  have  pushed  their  way 
into  some  position  too  big  for  their  small  dimensions. 

While  the  most  neighborly  feeling  existed  between  the 
classes,  the  gentry  of  the  South  rarely  married  out  of  their 
own  circles.  A  self-made  man  might  be  received  into  the 
best  society,  but  even  to  a  man  of  unusual  promise  there 
often  would  be  called  a  halt  when  he  spoke  of  marriage. 
The  old  "first  families"  were  in  this  matter  very  exclusive. 
"Since  the  war,"  however,  a  great  change  has  taken  place  in 
such  matters.  Thousands  of  the  best  families  of  the  South 
have  intermarried  with  what  are  called  "very  plain"  people. 

The  stout  yeoman  class  is  forging  to  the  front  rapidly. 
They  are,  in  many  cases,  educating  their  sons  and  daughters, 
fitting  them  to  become  associates  of  better-born  young  men 
and  women,  and  intermarriage  between  the  old  and  the  new 
families  is  very  common. 

In  public  life,  also,  the  self-made  men  are  taking  the  lead. 
Some  of  the  most  prominent  public  men  in  the  South  to-day 
are  of  humble  origin.  So  is  it  in  educational  matters.  Many 
of  the  rising  scholars  of  the  South  can  claim  no  connection 
with  the  old  "first  families."  In  many  of  the  colleges  and 
universities,  the  faculty  are  "making  silk  out  of  sows'  ears," 
and  the  sons  of  the  old  families  are  either  conspicuous  by 
their  absence  or  notorious  for  their  idleness.  Exceptions 
only  prove  the  rule. 

All  these  facts  are  attracting  the  notice  of  many  thought- 


126  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

f  ul  men  and  women.  He  who  runs  may  read  the  signs  of  a 
great  social  revolution  in  the  old  Southern  commonwealths, 
and  in  none  is  the  revolution  more  noticeable  than  in  the 
much-maligned  state  of  Virginia.  Merit,  not  blood,  is  now 
the  measure  of  manhood. 

Out  of  this  blending  of  sturdy  yeoman  blood,  refined 
by  education,  with  the  old  blood,  humbled  by  adversity  yet 
retaining  its  self-respect  and  its  great  traditions,  will  spring 
a  new  and  vigorous  stock,  to  make  the  South  blossom  like 
the  rose,  politically,  commercially,  and  mentally.  History 
repeat^  itself.  In  ancient  Rome,  the  blending  of  patrician 
and  plebeian  made  a  nation  that  conquered  the  then  known 
world. 

XI 

Truth,  Parity,  and  Piety 

In  the  South  of  the  earlier  periods,  purity  in  woman  and 
honor  in  man  outweighed  blood,  wealth,  and  social  po- 
sition. The  purity  of  the  women  was  required  to  be  ab- 
solute. A  divorce  was  almost  unheard  of,  is  not  to  this  day 
permitted  in  South  Carolina,  and  in  most  Southern  com- 
munities is  even  now  almost  a  social  stigma.  That  a  South- 
ern lady  should  be  divorced  from  one  man  in  the  morning 
and  marry  another  in  the  afternoon  is  practically  unthink- 
able. As  soon  think  of  a  Southern  girl's  marrying  her 
father's  negro  driver.  One  is  illegal ;  both  are  monstrosities. 

Every  Southern  boy  was  taught  to  tell  the  truth,  to  honor 
woman,  and  to  respect  religion. 


THE  HOMES  THAT  MADE  HEROES         127 

Out  of  the  old  Southern  honor  system,  by  an  exaggera- 
tion such  as  produced  the  knight-errant  of  the  days  of  chiv- 
alry, sprang  the  "code  duello,"  the  so-called  code  of  honor. 
While  undoubtedly  a  perversion,  duelling  had  its  basis  in  the 
right  soil,  that  is,  in  the  idea  that  a  gentleman  must  keep 
honor  bright.  Happily  for  all,  it  has  now  almost  passed  into 
oblivion. 

How  any  man  can  read  history  and  then  abuse  any  one 
section  is  simply  amazing.  Our  ancestors  both  in  America 
and  in  England,  if  judged  by  present  day  standards,  would 
have  to  be  declared  heartless  and  diabolical.  As  said  else- 
where, the  eighteenth  century  was  very  brutal.  The  very 
men  that  revolted,  against  England  and  fought  so  bravely, 
permitted  honest  laborers  to  be  shut  up  in  loathsome  prisons 
because  they  owed  a  bill  to  some  merchant.  While  crying 
out  against  England  for  confining  their  countrymen  in 
prison-ships  and  hulks,  the  Americans  of  the  Revolutionary 
era  tolerated  in  their  debtors'  prisons  deeds  of  cruelty  "in 
comparison  with  which  the  foulest  acts  committed  in  the 
hulks  sink  into  insignificance."  About  this  time,  the  North- 
ern states  were  taking  steps  towards  freeing  the  negroes. 
Because  the  South  moved  more  slowly,  some  Northern 
people  waxed  warm  with  "righteous  indignation,"  not 
sweeping  their  own  house  first  of  such  things  as  the  Newgate 
prison  and  the  prisons  at  Northampton,  Worcester,  and 
Philadelphia,  the  stories  of  which,  as  told  by  the  Northern 
historian  McMaster,  read  like  exaggerations  of  the  worst 
chapters  of  Uncle  Tom's  Cabin.  "Glass  Houses"— you  re- 
member the  proverb. 


128  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

The  South,  too,  had  her  debtors'  prisons.  She,  too,  was 
far  less  merciful  than  she  is  to-day.  Though  very  often 
done  mercifully,  the  whipping  of  slaves  was  sometimes  cruel, 
the  overseer  being  often  of  a  class  that  has  always  dis- 
liked the  negro  worse  than  the  higher  classes  have  ever 
done. 

If  negroes  were  sometimes  whipped  to  death  in  the  South, 
they  were  sometimes  burned  at  the  stake  in  the  North.  If 
in  our  day,  they  are  sometimes  lynched  in  the  South  for 
crimes  too  heinous  to  discuss  in  this  volume,  the  guilty  ones 
alone  are  dealt  with;  while  in  the  North  whole  negro  set- 
tlements and  communities  are  mobbed  and  burnt  for  the 
offenses  or  the  crimes  of  individuals.  The  negro  shows  his 
preference  by  staying  in  the  South.  There  he  can  make  an 
honest  living  without  interference,  and  is  not  punished  for 
the  sins  of  others. 

In  religious  matters,  the  South  was  conservative  and  or- 
thodox. Atheists  and  free-thinkers  were  almost  unknown; 
the  thousand  isms  of  other  sections  were  hardly  dreamed  of. 
All  gentlemen  respected  religion  and  subscribed  to  its  sup- 
port. The  South  has  always  been  a  church-going  people. 
The  churchyard  on  Sunday  morning  was  a  rendezvous  for 
all  classes,  and  the  slaves  were  welcomed  to  a  special  gallery. 
There  were,  we  believe,  more  accommodations  for  public 
worship  in  the  South  than  in  the  North,  more  seats  in  pro- 
portion to  population. 

Southern  men  hated  hypocrisy  and  cant ;  and  many  a  man 
staid  out  of  the  church  because  he  was  afraid  he  might 
bring  discredit  upon  religion.  Deception  in  any  form  was 
not  tolerated  by  the  despised  Southern  code-of-honor. 


ANDREW  JACKSON 


THE  HOMES  THAT  MADE  HEROES         129 

Gambling  used  to  be  a  national  amusement  in  America. 
To  play  for  money,  for  a  slave,  even  for  a  house  and  lot,  was 
good  form  for  many  generations.  To  cheat  at  cards,  how- 
ever, was  a  sin  beyond  forgiveness;  and  this  neat  distinc- 
tion is  still  drawn  in  some  quarters.  In  our  day,  playing  for 
money  is  no  longer  common  in  the  South,  but  ladies  in  some 
quarters  have  substituted  prizes.  The  gambling  propensities 
of  the  men  find  their  outlet  in  the  stock  exchanges  of  the 
large  cities,  and  buying  "futures"  is  confined  to  no  section. 
Who  shall  throw  the  first  stone  at  the  old  Southern  gentle- 
man for  gambling  and  betting?  He  who  does  so  must  be 
sure  that  he  himself  is  not  a  worse  offender. 

The  honor  system  applied  to  the  card  table  also.  A  debt 
incurred  there  was  regarded  as  a  debt  of  honor,  and  was  as 
promptly  paid. 

History  shows  conclusively  that  civil  wars — and  our  great 
war  was  a  civil  war  in  its  moral  aspects — have  a  disastrous 
effect  upon  the  morals  of  a  people.  This  all  students  of  his- 
tory must  admit,  if  they  are  candid.  And  yet  what  a  sub- 
lime spectacle  is  presented  by  the  old  commonwealth  of  Vir- 
ginia in  her  attitude  towards  her  creditors !  See  how  he- 
roically she  bends  her  shoulders  to  a  burden  that  she  might 
refuse  to  carry.  With  her  schools  and  colleges  needing 
hundreds  of  thousands,  with  her  great  heroes  lying  in  un- 
marked graves,  unable  to  make  a  good  appearance  among 
her  sister  states  at  national  exhibitions  or  to  advertise  her 
resources  adequately  at  the  Tercentenary  Exposition, 
she  has  recently  (1901)  obligated  herself  to  meet  an  enor- 
mous increase  in  the  annual  interest  on  a  debt  which  she 
9 


130  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

might  have  repudiated,  if  the  honor  of  her  men  had  not  re- 
volted from  such  a  measure. 

"  Still  in  our  ashes  live  their  wonted  fires." 

We  do  not,  however,  claim  that  our  people  are  perfect. 
We  must  be  candid  enough  to  admit  that  the  same  fearful 
convulsion  that  so  demoralized  the  men  of  the  North  and  of 
the  West  had  some  bad  effects  upon  the  generation  just  be- 
fore us,  and  also  upon  us  and  our  contemporaries.  If  men 
of  high  standing  in  other  sections  could  take  our  pictures, 
our  pianos,  and  our  family  silver,  and  send  them  home  under 
the  name  of  "trophies,"  it  is  very  probable  that  the  war 
somewhat  unsettled  our  moral  vision ;  and  all  history  proves 
that  the  moral  effects  of  a  civil  war  wear  off  more  slowly 
than  the  material.  After  making  all  fair  and  truthful  con- 
cessions, we  still  have  a  great  deal  to  be  proud  of  and  to 
thank  God  for.  The  noble  effort  of  Virginia  to  settle  her  old 
debt  honorably  has  already  been  referred  to.  What  grander 
sight  has  ever  been  seen  than  Wade  Hampton's  courteously 
but  firmly  declining  to  let  the  people  that  idolized  him  re- 
build his  house  when  it  was  destroyed  by  fire  ?  Did  General 
Lee  sell  his  name  to  commercial  concerns  whose  affairs  he 
could  not  superintend  in  person?  And  noble  beyond  ex- 
pression was  the  conduct  of  Gen.  Dabney  H.  Maury,  who, 
though  aged  and  feeble,  and  impoverished  by  the  war,  re- 
fused a  salary  of  $50,000  a  year  from  a  well-known  lot- 
tery. 


THE  HOMES  THAT  MADE  HEROES         131 

XII 

Slavery  in  the  Sooth 

No  feature  of  Southern  life  has  been  more  misrepre- 
sented and  misunderstood  than  African  slavery.  For 
a  long  time,  the  enemy  and  the  slanderer  did  most  of  the 
writing.  They  deluged  the  periodical  press  and  the  book 
market  with  tons  of  misrepresentation  and  abuse,  while  our 
Southern  forefathers  could  not  gain  a  hearing.  The  forum, 
the  senate  chamber,  and  the  pulpit,  also,  rang  with  denun- 
ciation of  the  "peculiar  institution,"  and,  by  gaining  the  ear 
of  the  world,  stirred  up  a  whirlpool  of  feeling  against  the 
system.  The  false  impression  produced  by  one  book  has 
never  been  eradicated. 

Slavery  had  its  sunshine  and  its  shadows.  The  bright 
side  has  never  been  told ;  the  dark  side  has  been  grossly  ex- 
aggerated, and  painted  in  colors  blacker  than  the  hinges  of 
Hades. 

No  agricultural  laborer  has  ever  had  food  so  nutritious 
and  so  plentiful  as  the  plantation  negro.  He  had,  as  a  rule, 
a  kind  and  considerate  master,  self-interest  and  humanity 
combining  to  make  his  master  feed  him  plentifully,  clothe 
him  comfortably,  see  that  he  was  not  overworked,  and  look 
after  him  in  sickness.  His  working  days  were  from  two  to 
four  hours  shorter  than  those  of  European  laborers. 

In  this  connection,  Bishop  R.  H.  Wilmer,  of  Alabama, 
tells  an  interesting  mule  story.  A  thoroughly  honest-hearted 
Northern  man  once  asked  him  whether  negroes  were  really 
harnessed  to  a  plough  and  made  to  do  the  work  of  a  mule, 


132  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

as  abolitionists  had  told  him.  The  Bishop  asked  him  how 
much  a  mule  cost,  and  he  said  one  hundred  dollars.  Then  he 
asked  him  how  much  an  able-bodied  slave  to  put  to  a  plough 
would  cost,  and  he  said  a  thousand  dollars.  Then  he  asked 
him  how  many  negroes  it  would  take  to  draw  a  plough,  and 
he  said,  "Eight  or  ten."  "Then,"  said  the  Bishop,  "apart 
.from  our  good  feeling  towards  the  slave,  do  you  think  we 
would  spend  $8,000  or  $10,000  where  $100  would  be  suffi- 
cient?" 

When  the  servants,  as  they  were  called,  were  sick,  the  doc- 
tor was  sent  for  and  "Ole  Missis"  went  to  "the  quarters" 
with  her  scales,  calomel,  and  rhubarb.  When  disabled  by 
age,  home,  food,  and  clothing  were  still  provided  them.  No 
wonder  they  loved  "Ole  Marster  "  and  "Ole  Missis,"  and 
would  follow  them  to  the  ends  of  creation. 

No  such  system  of  slavery  ever  existed  elsewhere  under 
heaven.  Most  writers  of  text-books  for  our  schools  and  col- 
leges do  not  feel  called  upon  to  make  this  statement,  but  pre- 
judice our  children  against  slavery  in  the  abstract,  and  state 
no  extenuating  circumstances.  They  tell  about  Greek  and 
Roman  slavery,  where  the  slave  was  often  superior  to  his 
master  morally  and  mentally,  but  do  not  tell  how  American 
slavery  lifted  the  poor  African  out  of  his  degradation,  and 
fitted  him  to  be  the  noblest  character  in  the  most  famous  of 
American  novels. 

A  popular  text-book  on  history  tells  us  that,  in  ancient 
Rome,  "sick  and  hopelessly  infirm  slaves  were  taken  to  an 
island  in  the  Tiber  and  left  there  to  die  of  starvation  and 
exposure."  A  class  brought  up  on  Uncle  Tom's  Cabin  and 


THE  HOMES  THAT  MADE  HEROES         133 

other  specious  books  naturally  thinks  the  poor,  down-trod- 
den slaves  of  the  ante-bellum  South  were  similarly  mal- 
treated. The  Northern  author,  however,  does  not  feel 
obliged  to  stop  and  vindicate  his  Southern  neighbors,  though 
a  Southern  writer  would  almost  unconsciously  defend  his 
people  against  such  base  insinuations.  He  would  tell  the 
class  how  "Ole  Marster"  would  go  to  old  Uncle  Henry  and 
old  Aunt  Molly,  thank  them  for  their  long  and  faithful  ser- 
vice, point  them  to  a  new  cabin  just  built  by  the  plantation 
carpenters,  and  tell  them  to  take  that  and  enough  land  for  a 
garden  to  work  when  they  felt  able,  come  to  the  meat  house 
and  storeroom  regularly  for  their  rations,  and  not  worry 
about  working  any  more  as  long  as  he  and  his  boys  had  a 
home  to  give  them. 

In  this  connection,  we  shall  quote  Percy  Greg,  the  English 
historian.  He  made  a  most  careful  and  disinterested  study 
of  American  history,  among  other  things  slavery,  and  came 
to  the  conclusion  that  the  Southern  negro  was  the  happiest 
agricultural  laborer  in  the  world.  Greg  says :  "Releasd  from 
anxiety,  transplanted  to  a  healthy  and  congenial  climate, 
the  animal  energies  of  barbarism  combined  with  the  advan- 
tages of  a  high  foreign  civilization  would  have  ensured  the 
rapid  increase  of  the  negro  population.  But  their  actual 
rate  of  multiplication  during  the  first  sixty  years  of  this  cen- 
tury bore  witness  to  a  combination  of  favorable  influences 
such  as  have  never  been  united  save  among  the  most  favored 
classes  of  the  highest,  most  civilized,  and  most  energetic 
European  communities.  Abundance  without  luxury,  labor 
which  could  not  be  made  half  as  severe  or  effective  as  that 
of  English  operatives  or  Continental  peasant-proprietors, 


134  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

the  vigilant  supervision  of  Anglo-Saxon  intelligence, 
methods,  and  science,  quickened  by  enlightened  interest  and 
natural  humanity,  prevented  the  infant  mortality  due  to 
parental  incompetence  or  neglect,  protected  the  negro  race 
from  the  waste  of  life  caused  elsewhere  by  overwork  and 
underfeeding,  by  unwholesome  habits,  and  by  the  thousand 
disorders  that  keep  down  the  numbers  of  a  proletariate  left 
to  its  own  guidance.  Cruelty,  hardship,  discontent,  mental 
or  physical  suffering,  ill-usage  of  any  kind,  would  have 
been,  as  they  are  known  everywhere  to  be,  powerful  prevent- 
ive influences.  The  vital  statistics  of  American  slavery 
alone  are  conclusive  evidence  of  the  material  well-being  and 
mental  ease  of  the  slaves.  It  does  not  follow  that  slavery 
was  favorable  to  the  mental  or  moral  character  of  the  negro, 
still  less  that  it  was  economically,  morally,  or  politically  ad- 
vantageous to  the  masters  as  a  class  or  to  the  community  as 
a  whole.  But  no  economist  and  no  candid  student  of  South- 
ern history  can  doubt  that  as  human  chattels,  as  intelligent 
laboring  machines,  as  valuable  beasts  of  burden,  the  slaves 
were  well  treated  and  well  cared  for ;  that  overwork,  exces- 
sive severity,  physical  hardship,  conscious  suffering  of  mind 
cr  body,  must  have  been  rare  exceptions."* 

XIII 

The  Feudal  Baron 

The  planter  was  a  sort  of  feudal  baron.     "Vassals  and 
serfs"    at    his    side,    might    be    said    of    him    with    more 

*Greg's  "United  States,"  Vol.  II,  p.  352,  American  ecfition. 


THE  HOMES  THAT  MADE  HEROES        135 

truth  than  poetry.  The  vassal  was  the  overseer,  and 
he  was  far  more  apt  to  be  unkind  to  the  servants  than  his 
employer.  Of  kind  overseers  there  were  many;  but,  often- 
times, they  were  either  rough  men  of  the  South  or  brutal 
fellows  from  the  North  who  hated  the  negro,  and  rode 
roughshod  over  him  when  the  master  could  not  catch  them. 
Mean  overseers  helped  to  bring  slavery  into  discredit.  Such 
men,  put  in  charge  of  cotton  and  sugar  plantations  by  non- 
resident owners,  brought  a  stigma  upon  the  system  that 
helped  to  overthrow  it.  Of  such  a  type  is  Legree  in  Uncle 
Tom's  Cabin. 

Southern  gentlemen  dealt  tenderly  with  their  "servants," 
as  they  called  them;  they  were  often  less  lenient  with  their 
own  children.  The  idea  of  a  "lashing  planter,"  as  repre- 
sented in  the  pictorial  schoolbook  already  referred  to,  is  ut- 
terly misleading.  By  the  same  reasoning,  a  'father'  might 
be  defined  and  illustrated  as  a  cruel  man  who  whips  his 
children. 

It  is  estimated  that  about  one  Southern  man  in  three  was 
a  slave-owner.  A  man  would  buy  one  or  more  servants  and 
keep  them  as  an  investment  and  a  convenience.  A  very 
small  numbr  of  men,  mostly  planters,  had  large  numbers; 
but  the  planters  often  hired  laborers. 

It  is  said  that  only  one  Southern  soldier  in  ten  held  prop- 
erty in  slaves;  of  course,  many  were  the  sons  of  slave- 
owners. It  is  probable,  however,  that  seven-eighths  of  the 
Southern  people  were  vitally  interested  in  slavery;  and  its 
forcible  and  sudden  abolition  brought  utter  bankruptcy  to 
the  whole  South. 


136  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

The  planter,  while  giving  his  servants  food  and  clothing 
in  abundance,  looked  after  their  moral  and  religious  inter- 
ests. The  young  girls  were  carefully  looked  after,  to  see  that 
they  did  not  go  astray.  If  the  overseer  or  his  sons  violated 
the  planter's  code  of  morals,  great  would  be  the  latter's  in- 
dignation. Aged  colored  people  in  the  South  say  that  the 
morals  of  the  race  have  grown  much  worse  since  the  days 
of  slavery.  The  greatest  curse  to  the  colored  man  of  to-day 
is  his  lack  of  friendly  contact  with  the  white  race,  the  ill- 
feeling  due  to  his  unhappy  use  of  the  ballot.  The  colored 
man  has  no  truer  friends  than  his  white  neighbors  would  be, 
if  scheming  politicians  had  not  turned  him  against  them. 

One  shadow,  as  already  said,  was  the  maltreatment  of 
slaves  on  the  part  of  some  overseers  and  a  few  masters. 
These,  however,  rarely  belonged  to  the  higher  classes,  where 
maltreatment  of  servants  led  to  social  ostracism.  Hypo- 
crites, liars,  "nigger-traders,"  as  they  were  called,  and  men 
that  maltreated  servants,  were  universally  despised  and 
hated. 

Another  shadow  was  the  occasional  breaking  up  of  fam- 
ilies. This,  however,  was  comparatively  rare.  We  know  of 
a  few  old  colored  people  that  were  separated  from  wife  or 
husband ;  but,  on  the  other  hand,  we  know  of  many  masters 
that  would  incur  very  great  inconvenience  and  expense 
rather  than  permit  such  separation.  Even  hiring  was 
avoided  by  many  to  keep  family  ties  from  being  broken. 
Southern  gentlemen  were  humane  and  tender  in  this  matter, 
and  the  statements  to  the  contrary  in  many  books  are  to  a 
large  extent  without  foundation. 

If  the  planter  was  a  sort  of  feudal  baron,  he  was  also  a 


THE  HOMES  THAT  MADE  HEROES         137 

patriarch,  a  judge,  and  a  lawgiver — the  Abraham,  the  Oth- 
i.iel,  and  the  Moses  of  his  people.  He  often  dispensed  jus- 
tice and  settled  their  disputes  in  a  biblical  and  patriarchal 
manner.  In  cases  beyond  his  jurisdiction,  he  went  with  them 
into  the  courts,  sometimes  using  his  means  and  his  influence 
to  save  them  from  the  law,  if  he  thought  they  should  not  be 
punished.  At  times,  however,  he  would  let  the  law  take  its 
course;  and  in  this  case  the  jury,  seeing  the  slave  apparently 
deserted  by  his  master,  would  mitigate  the  punishment. 

An  industrious,  frugal  slave  could  by  making  extra  time 
buy  himself  from  his  master.  Sometimes  they  would  hire 
themselves  from  their  masters,  set  up  for  themselves  in  some 
trade  or  business,  and  pay  the  sum  demanded.  By  having 
gardens  and  selling  the  vegetables,  by  the  skillful  use  of 
tools,  by  spinning  and  weaving,  the  industrious  slave  could 
earn  no  little  money,  and  often  lent  money  to  his  master. 
These  happy  conditions,  however,  were  rendered  less  pos- 
sible by  the  abolition  movement.  In  self-defense,  the  South 
had  to  curtail  the  number  of  "free  negroes,"  as  they  were 
made  tools  of  by  the  abolitionists. 

As  said  already,  a  gallery  was  set  aside  in  the  churches 
for  the  servants.  In  addition  to  this,  churches  were  built  for 
them  by  their  owners.  Where  there  were  only  a  few,  they 
were  often  brought  into  family  prayers.  No  slave  class,  no 
agricultural  laborers,  ever  had  their  religious  interests  more 
carefully  attended  to.  The  younger  generation,  however, 
have  little  use  for  the  white  man's  church  or  his  religion. 

Of  course  there  were  cruel  masters,  just  as  there  are  cruel 
fathers  and  cruel  husbands.  No  one  despises  fathers  and 


138  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

husbands  as  a  class.  Why,  then,  should  slaveholders  have 
been  held  up  to  the  odium  of  the  world,  because  some  were 
unkind  and  cruel? 

Elderly  colored  people  talk  now  with  deep  emotion  of 
their  old  masters.  If  they  could  write  books,  the  world 
would  burn  Uncle  Tom's  Cabin,  and  curse  it  as  a  libel.  If 
half  the  tales  of  cruelty  palmed  off  on  a  long-suffering  pub- 
lic had  been  true,  the  torch  and  the  axe  of  the  slave  would 
have  disbanded  the  Southern  armies;  but,  led  by  the  gentle 
hand  of  woman,  the  dark  battalions  moved  out,  day  after 
day,  winter  and  summer,  to  make  the  crops  that  fed  the 
masters  at  the  front  of  battle. 

The  atrocious  acts  that  now  lead  to  lynching  in  the  South 
are  emphatically  the  freedman's  license.  Before  the  war  and 
during  the  war,  if  he  did  not  love,  he  at  least  looked  up  to 
his  master  and  his  family,  and  would  not  have  dreamed  of 
laying  his  hands  upon  them,  save  to  fondle  his  "little  mistis" 
and  "little  marster." 

XIV 
The  "Lazy"  Planter 

Possibly  we  have  turned  aside  a  little  from  our  main 
argument.  In  this  volume,  however,  no  paragraph, 
no  chapter,  is  really  a  digression,  if  it  either  directly  or  in- 
directly, pleads  the  cause  of  the  South,  sets  forth  her  great 
part  in  the  making  of  our  country,  refutes  any  slur  made 
against  her  in  history,  encyclopedia,  literature,  by  editor, 
poet,  or  professor. 


THE  HOMES  THAT  MADE  HEROES        139 

Let  us  now  return  to  the  old  plantation,  to  the  throngs  of 
servants  that  used  to  love  "Ole  Marster."  These  great  com- 
panies and  regiments  of  slaves  had  to  have  good  officers; 
and  such  were  found  in  the  planter,  his  sons,  and  the  over- 
seer. The  habit  of  command  thus  acquired  by  the  men  of 
the  South  developed  leadership,  and,  as  already  shown,  the 
planter  civilization  furnished  in  all  crises  statesmen  and 
soldiers  and  great  military  leaders. 

The  indolence-and-ease-and-luxury  theory  was  not  in- 
vented in  any  recent  period.  When  the  troubles  between 
England  and  her  colonies  were  waxing  serious,  some  Eng- 
lishmen predicted  that  there  would  be  slight  resistance  from 
the  Southern  colonies.  How  little  they  knew  of  the  mettle 
of  our  colonial  fathers!  With  far  greater  wisdom  and  in- 
sight did  Edmund  Burke,  the  philosophic  orator  of  parlia- 
ment, read  their  character.  He  told  England  that  the  people 
of  the  Southern  colonies  were  much  more  strongly  and  stub- 
bornly devoted  to  freedom  than  those  of  the  Northern,  and 
that  all  history  would  show  that,  in  "all  masters  of  slaves 
who  were  not  slaves  themselves,  the  haughtiness  of  domi- 
nation combines  with  the  spirit  of  freedom,  fortifies  it,  and 
renders  it  invincible." 

Proofs  of  this  in  abundance  can  be  found  in  Southern 
history.  Who  defied  the  Crown  in  the  Parsons'  Cause  in 
1763?  Who  passed  the  Five  Resolutions  two  years  later? 
Who  poured  out  their  blood  at  Alamance  in  1771?  Who 
adopted  the  Mecklenburg  Declaration,  drafted  the  first  con- 
stitution of  a  free  American  commonwealth,  moved  and 
penned  the  Declaration  of  Independence,  and  led  the  armies 


140  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

of  the  united  colonies?  The  answer  rises  to  your  lips: 
"Masters  of  slaves  who  were  not  slaves  themselves,"  the  in- 
domitable and  patriotic  Southern  planters,  our  forefathers 
of  a  sturdy  era. 

Nor  did  time  enfeeble  this  mighty  stock.  In  later  periods 
this  planter  civilization  furnished  political  and  military 
leaders  for  several  decades,  fought  England  in  1812,  con- 
quered Mexico,  added  Louisiana,  Florida,  New  Mexico, 
California,  and  Texas  to  the  Union;  and  in  1861  furnished 
a  half  a  million  of  the  greatest  soldiers  the  world  has  ever 
seen,  and  leaders  such  as  Hampton,  Beauregard,  Forrest, 
Sidney  Johnston,  and  Stonewall  Jackson. 

Their  sons  and  grandsons  had  to  fight  the  battle  of  free- 
dom again  at  a  later  era.  The  declaration  that  their  fore- 
fathers of  1776  had  drawn  no  longer  protected  them.  The 
constitution  of  1787,  which  the  genius  of  their  sires  helped 
to  perfect,  \vas  turned  against  them.  The  right  of  secession, 
which  was  so  glorious  when  used  against  England,  was  an 
unpardonable  crime  when  used  against  sister  states  that  had 
violated  their  solemn  compact.  Instead  of  the  impressment 
of  sailors  on  the  high  seas,  they  suffered  the  impressment  of 
servants  on  their  own  soil.  Instead  of  maltreatment  from  an 
unnatural  mother,  they  have  that  of  brothers  in  whose  de- 
fense they  had  staked  their  lives,  their  liberties,  and  their 
sacred  honor  in  the  War  of  the  Revolution,  and  whose  com- 
mercial interests  they  had  protected  at  the  cost  of  blood  and 
treasure  in  the  second  war  with  England.  They  will  ask  to 
be  "let  alone"  and  to  be  permitted  to  "depart  in  peace,"  but 
the  answer  will  be  the  sword  and  the  fagot. 


THE  HOMES  THAT  MADE  HEROES         141 

Yes,  the  lazy  planter  has  saved  this  country  and  must 
save  it  in  future  eras.  But  for  him,  there  would  have  been 
no  King's  Mountain,  no  Cowpens,  no  Saratoga,  no  York- 
town.  To  him  we  owe  New  Orleans,  Monterey,  Buena 
Vista.  His  intelligent  grasp  of  public  questions  has  made 
him  a  patriot  and  a  soldier.  His  hours  of  rest  in  his  library 
give  us  Masons,  Madisons,  and  Washingtons.  When  the 
old  planter  civilization  becomes  effete,  the  "traveller  from 
New  Zealand  shall  sit  upon  a  broken  arch"  of  Brooklyn 
Bridge  "and  sketch  the  ruins"  of  Manhattan. 

That  there  were  some  lazy  planters,  we  admit  readily. 
That  too  many  of  them  left  their  plantations  to  overseers 
and  managers,  we  shall  not  deny.  But,  while  lingering 
around  the  fire  at  the  "Old  Raleigh,"  the  "Red  Lion,"  and 
other  taverns,  they  were  discussing  questions  of  matchless 
importance,  and  were  fitting  themselves  to  write  out  declar- 
ations and  constitutions,  and  to  maintain  them  on  the  field 
of  battle. 

The  lazy  planter  was  not  idling.  Even  when  lolling  at 
the  courthouse  or  at  the  tavern,  to  talk  with  his  cronies  on 
the  questions  of  the  day,  he  was  but  following  the  bent  of 
his  genius,  his  inborn  talent  for  government.  Thither  na- 
ture herself  led  him.  Thither  he  went  spontaneously  as  the 
young  swan  to  the  pool  or  as  the  bird  to  the  air ;  and  from 
his  inborn  love  of  public  affairs,  of  politics,  if  the  word  must 
be  written,  was  evolved  the  great  Southern  supremacy  in  the 
government — a  supremacy  which  was  both  the  wonder  and 
the  hissing  of  some  other  sections  of  the  Union. 


142  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

XV. 

Uncle  Tom's  Cabin  and  Other  Slurs 

A  beautiful  and  sturdy  civilization,  we  see,  was  that 
of  the  ante-bellum  South.  If  a  free  may  be  judged  by  its 
fruits,  we  may  well  be  proud  of  that  era  in  our  social  history. 
Let  us  present  it  in  its  true  light  to  our  children  and  our 
children's  children.  That  it  was  perfect,  we  do  not  say ;  no 
civilization  is  perfect.  That  it  had  some  dark  sides,  we  may 
admit  readily.  We  must  not,  however,  let  those  that  come 
after  us  read,  unrefuted,  the  hostile  books  that  describe 
the  effeminate,  indolent  Southern  gentleman — your  grand- 
father; the  proud,  haughty,  brutal  "slave-holder" — your 
grandfather  again;  his  trifling,  immoral  sons — your  father 
among  them.  Let  us  put  our  everlasting  condemnation 
upon  the  books  that  have  made  the  South  a  byword 
and  a  hissing  among  the  nations,  especially  that  most 
plausible  and  most  misleading  of  all  books,  Uncle 
Tom's  Cabin,  in  which  an  ideal  and  almost  impossible 
"Uncle  Tom,"  an  overseer,  Legree,  who  could  not  have 
kept  his  place  on  a  gentleman's  plantation, —  a  Northern 
man  by  the  way — and  whippings  such  as  were  rarely  per- 
mitted, and  cruelties  never  tolerated  are  held  up  as  types, 
instead  of  as  figments  of  the  imagination  or  as  monstrosities. 
These  things  let  us  teach  our  children  and  their  children. 
For  the  stranger  that  comes  with  butter  in  his  mouth  and 
war  in  his  heart,  let  us  have  ready  the  retort  with  which  the 
good  Bishop  Richard  H.  Wilmer,  of  Alabama,  silenced  a 


THE  HOMES  THAT  MADE  HEROES         143 

slanderer :  "Uncle  Tom,  who  was,  you  say,  one  of  the  finest 
characters  you  ever  read  of,  was  a  slave.  Africa  did  not  pro- 
duce him,  does  not  now  produce  him.  Does  not  the  book 
go  to  show  that,  if  you  want  to  find  the  best  specimen,  of 
honesty  and  piety  among  servants,  you  must  seek  him  among 
the  slaves?  Eva,  you  say,  is  one  of  the  most  lovely  of  her 
sex,  gentle  and  refined,  a  beautiful  character  indeed ;  was  she 
not  a  slave-holder  ?  Legree,  you  rightly  say,  was  the  worst 
character  in  the  book,  a  vile  and  cruel  man.  Was  he  not  a 
Northern  man  that  came  South,,  trafficked  in  slaves,  and 
maltreated  them?"  "A  profound  silence  ensued,"  says  the 
good  Bishop. 

Uncle  Tom  we  have  pronounced  an  almost  impossible 
character.  One,  and  only  one,  slave  measuring  up  to  Mrs. 
Stowe's  hero  have  we  ever  heard  of ;  and  it  would  be  utterly 
misleading  to  take  such  a  rare  and  almost  miraculous  char- 
acter and  use  him  as  representative. 

Many  true  and  faithful  old  slaves  there  doubtless  were, 
and  some  of  them  we  have  been  thrown  with.  Their  very 
virtues  are  due  to  their  contact  with  a  higher  civilization. 
Slavery  lifted  the  African  race  from  paganism  and  barbar- 
ism, and  made  thousands  of  them  true  to  their  fellow-men 
and  to  their  Creator.  For  this  reason,  men  like  Stonewall 
Jackson  gave  it  their  approval,  and  men  like  Jefferson  Davis 
defended  it  in  the  senate. 

Some  colored  people  are,  undoubtedly,  better  than  many 
white  people.  Colored  men  and  women  of  fine  character 
there  are  among  us.  As  a  race,  however,  the  negro  does  not 
measure  up  to  any  high  standard,  either  intellectually  or 


144  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

morally,  and  as  a  race  he  seems  to  be  lacking  in  moral  re- 
sponsibility. His  great  need  is  domestic  purity  and  personal 
chastity. 

XVI 
«  Of  the  Old  School » 

We  trust  that  the  young  reader  has  caught  a  view  of 
our  beautiful  ante-bellum  civilization.  A  few  repre- 
sentatives of  that  era  are  still  among  us :  you  have  known 
some;  the  writer,  many.  Courtly  old  gentlemen  they 
were;  noble  and  queenly  women.  To  sit  in  their  presence, 
hear  their  musical  voices,  listen  to  their  talk  about  "old 
times  before  the  war"  was  a  benediction.  Dear  old  grand- 
fathers and  grandmothers,  venerable  great-aunts  and  great- 
uncles,  even  now  pass  before  the  mind's  eye,  and  smile  gra- 
ciously upon  us.  Let  us,  my  young  reader,  imitate  their  vir- 
tues. If  faults  they  had,  let  us  try  to  avoid  them;  yet  we 
rather  think  that  ours  are  a  thousandfold  more  in  quantity 
and  worse  in  quality. 

Some  phases  of  their  life  and  character  do  not  come 
within  the  scope  of  this  book,  and  will  be  found  in  the 
charming  volumes  of  Thomas  Nelson  Page  and  other  novel- 
ists. A  few  points  we  may  mention  in  connection  \vith  our 
treatment  of  the  ante-bellum  period. 

The  highest  compliment  that  is  ever  paid  a  man  in  the 
South  is  to  call  him  "a  gentleman  of  the  old  school;"  that 
includes  everything.  It  means  that  he  is  honest  in  business, 
is  refined  in  his  tastes,  is  courteous  towards  his  inferiors,  is 
chivalrous  toward  woman,  has  great  respect  for  religion. 


THE  HOMES  THAT  MADE  HEROES         145 

Let  us  state  our  recollections  of  some  of  these  men. 

These  gentlemen  were  polite,  but  not  bootlicking,  like 
some  of  their  modern  imitators.  They  were  so  sincere  as  to 
seem  at  times  brusque  in  their  manners.  They  paid  their 
debts  at  the  rate  of  a  hundred  cents  on  the  dollar,  and  many 
of  them  were  more  than  impoverished'  by  paying  security 
debts  for  other  people.  They  hated  "short  cuts"  in  business. 
They  despised  sneaks,  hypocrites,  negro  traders,  deserters, 
scalawags,  and  carpetbaggers.  They  looked  with  suspicion 
upon  the  soft,  velvety,  smooth-tongued  fellow  that  can  get 
into  your  office,  glide  noiselessly  across  the  floor,  and  slip 
his  hand,  glistening  with  seal  rings,  into  yours  before  you 
know  that  anyone  has  entered.  They  were  "open  and 
aboveboard"  in  all  their  dealings.  If  they  played  cards  for 
money,  it  was  in  a  gentleman's  parlor,  not  in  a  secret  cham- 
ber protected  by  a  bribed  policeman.  They  took  their  tod- 
dies and  their  juleps,  but  were  not  drunkards.  They  talked 
more  sense  in  one  evening  than  we  do  in  a  month.  They 
knew  more  of  Horace  than  we  do  of  Tennyson.  They  had 
the  polish  of  Chesterfield  without  his  vices.  After  reverses 
came,  they  wore  sleek,  shining  broadcloth  coats  left  over 
from  old  times,  because  they  did  not  wish,  like  some  of  us, 
to  owe  for  a  new  one  — forever. 

This  writer,  you  see,  believes  in  the  past.  He  loves  and 
treasures  its  hallowed  memories.  He  longs  for  "the  tender 
grace  of  a  day  that  is  dead,"  and  feels  with  the  poet: 

"  It  is  not  now  as  it  hath  been  of  yore; — 
Turn  whereso'er  I  may, 
By  night  or  day, 
The  things  which  I  have  seen  I  now  can  see  no  more." 

10 


146  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

CHAPTER  III 
THE  HUNDRED  YEARS'  WRANGLE 


LIFE  is  made  up  of  lights  and  shadows.  As  with  men 
and  women,  so  it  is  with  states  and  with  nations.  The 
joys  of  the  South  in  the  period  already  outlined  were 
great;  but  her  sorrows  were  sometimes  well-nigh  insup- 
portable. She  felt  at  times  like  an  orphan,  a  foundling,  like 
a  stranger  in  her  father's  house.  The  Declaration  which  her 
Richard  Henry  Lee  had  "moved,"  which  her  Jefferson  had 
drafted,  and  which  her  Washington  had  maintained  with 
the  sword,  no  longer  seemed  to  protect  her  in  the  Union. 
The  constitution  which  her  Washington,  her  Madison,  her 
Mason,  her  Pinckneys,  her  Davie,  her  Williamson,  her  Rut- 
ledge,  her  Baldwin,  and  other  great  sons  had  helped  to  draft, 
no  longer  seemed  to  protect  her  and  her  institutions.  Let  us 
inquire  the  reasons. 

We  often  hear  that  the  war  between  the  North  and  the 
South  was  "inevitable."  The  phrase  "irrepressible  conflict" 
was  coined  by  a  Northern  statesman,  and  soon  became  popu- 


THE  HUNDRED  TEARS'  WRANGLE  147 

lar  in  some  sections.  All  such  phrases  are  utterly  mislead- 
ing. There  is  no  good,  substantial  reason  why  the  North 
and  the  South  should  have  felt  a  dislike  so  deep  as  to  poison 
for  years  the  life  of  the  republic  and  make  them  stand  more 
or  less  aloof  even  at  the  present  moment. 

We  may  admit  that  there  were  two  distinct  civilizations 
on  this  continent.  We  may  admit  that  the  two  peoples  dif- 
fered in  political  ideas,  in  religious  beliefs,  in  social  customs ; 
but  such  differences  did  not  have  to  be  settled  on  the  bloody 
field  of  battle,  with  its  years  of  agony  and  its  centuries  of 
hatred.  If  differences  in  civilization  led  to  armed  conflict, 
the  United  States  would  be  in  civil  war  incessantly.  The  so- 
called  "gulf"  between  the  North  and  the  South  of  the  earlier 
periods  is  nothing  compared  with  the  yawning  chasm  which 
at  this  moment  separates  the  West  from  all  the  old  centers 
of  civilization. 

The  ill-feeling  between  the  North  and  the  South  is  one  of 
the  oldest,  and  is  the  deepest,  of  sectional  animosities.  It  be- 
gan in  the  colonial  era,  and  has  lasted  to  some  extent  to  the 
present.  Differences  in  climate,  in  views  of  government,  in 
pursuits,  in  religion,  do  not  explain  it.  In  colonial  days  the 
Pennsylvania  Quaker  and  the  New  York  "churchman"  hated 
the  New  England  Puritan,  and  in  the  troubles  with  England 
rallied  but  slowly  to  his  assistance,  but  in  later  eras  all  three 
combined  against  the  Southern  planter.  After  independence 
was  achieved,  "Pennsylvania  discriminated  against  Dela- 
ware and  New  Jersey ;  Connecticut  and  Pennsylvania  quar- 
reled over  the  Valley  of  Wyoming;  New  York  and  New 
Hampshire,  over  the  Green  Mountains;"  but  later  on  these 


148  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

dislikes  were  forgotten  in  the  common  dislike  for  the  "slave- 
ocracy"  of  the  South.  To-day,  as  a  consequence,  we  have 
the  Solid  South  following  the  lead  of  a  handful  of  Northern 
and  Western  politicians. 

Why,  then,  this  old  sectional  feeling?  Why  did  Puritan 
New  England  dislike  the  planters  of  Virginia  so  violently 
that  the  animosity  swallowed  up  so  many  local  jealousies 
and  lasted  till  the  present? 

Various  solutions  have  been  offered.  Many  think  that  the 
Puritan  and  the  Cavalier,  in  emigrating  from  England, 
brought  their  old  grudge  with  them  in  the  Mayflower,  the 
Discovery,  the  Godspeed,  and  the  Susan  Constant.  Fiske 
tells  us  that  the  New  Englander  and  the  Virginian  disliked 
each  other,  the  Virginia  Cavaliers  looking  down  upon  the 
people  of  New  England  as  a  race  of  shopkeepers,  and  the 
New  Englanders  despising  the  Cavaliers  as  'haughty,  domi- 
neering, purse-proud  aristocrats,  like  Squire  Western  in 
Fielding's  History  of  a  Foundling.  That  this  feeling  existed 
all  history  shows  us.  That  the  antipathy  still  exists  to  some 
extent,  we  admit  candidly.  That  it  alone  would  have  pro- 
duced a  war  horrible  in  its  proportions,  we  do  not  believe  for 
a  moment. 

A  thoughtful  scholar  of  our  day  puts  "spatial  separation" 
—that  is,  distance — among  the  elemental  causes  of  sectional 
feeling.  No  doubt  better  acquaintance  might  have  helped 
matters.  Had  our  earlier  generations  been  better  acquainted 
with  each  other,  they  might  have  judged  each  other  less  se- 
verely, and  been  more  willing  to  bear  each  other's  burdens 
and  help  to  solve  each  other's  problems. 


THE  HUNDRED  YEARS'  WRANGLE  149 

Another  reason  often  given  is  "differing  social  antece- 
dents" in  the  old  country.  This  presupposes  that  the  whole 
North  and  the  whole  South  came  from  different  ranks  of 
society  in  the  mother  country.  We  know,  however,  that 
only  a  minority  of  the  Southern  people  claimed  descent  from 
the  gentry  and  the  nobility  of  England.  The  great  mass  of 
the  Virginians  and  the  Carolinians  sprang  from  the  yeoman 
classes.  Only  a  select  few  were  so  aristocratic  as  to  excite 
jealousy  and  hatred.  The  average  Southern  family  had  no 
reason  to  look  down  upon  the  masses  of  New  England. 

Another  cause  often  given  is  the  "difference  in  local  ad- 
ministration ;"  that  is,  the  New  Englanders  held  to  township 
government,  government  by  town  meetings,  while  the 
planters  of  the  South,  living  in  remote  country  neighbor- 
hoods, adopted  the  county  system.  That  this  political  differ- 
ence led  to  social  differences,  we  of  course  know.  The  fact 
that  the  Virginia  planter  "ran  his  course  remote  from  men," 
lived  in  isolation,  and  ruled  his  dependents  as  a  sort  of  feudal 
baron,  did  tend  to  make  him  lordly  and  overbearing ;  but  the 
contact  between  the  old  Virginia  Cavalier-planter  and  the 
New  Englander  was  in  those  days  too  slight  to  mention. 
Only  the  leaders  took  the  long  tedious  journeys  across 
Mason  and  Dixon's  line ;  the  masses  never  met  each  other. 

These  explanations  do  not  explain.  We  must  seek  further 
for  a  solution. 

Many  writers  speak  of  "climatic  causes."  Not  that  the 
likes  or  dislikes  of  races  and  of  peoples  depend  directly  upon 
the  thermometer,  but  that  climate  largely  determines  occu- 
pation ;  that  difference  in  occupation  leads  to  difference  in 


150  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

interests ;  and  that  these  in  turn  lead  to  a  demand  for  laws 
that  injure  some  portion  of  the  country. 

Most  of  these  causes  may  have  helped  to  alienate  the 
North  from  the  South.  Not  all  of  them  combined  would,  we 
think,  have  brought  on  a  bloody  conflict.  It  was  secession 
that  caused  the  war.  It  was  to  save  the  Union  that  the 
whole  North  rose  to  its  feet  and  marched  across  the  Poto- 
mac. Only  a  few  Northern  soldiers  were  fighting  to  free  the 
slaves ;  and  President  Lincoln  himself  did  not  interfere  with 
slavery  until  he  thought  that  such  action  should  be  taken  as 
a  war  measure  to  strengthen  the  North,  weaken  the  South, 
and  excite  the  sympathy  of  foreign  nations. 

(2)  VIEWS  OF  THE  CONSTITUTION 

(a)  THB  LEAGUE  OR  COMPACT  THEORY 

One  most  unfortunate  thing  was  that  the  two  sections 
came  to  take  opposite  and  conflicting  views  of  the  constitu- 
tion. We  say  "came  to  take;"  for  at  first  there  was  no 
strictly  sectional  division  as  to  the  unsettled  questions  of  the 
constitution.  At  first  the  New  England  statesmen  were  as 
zealous  for  states  rights  as  the  Southern;  and  we  shall  see 
later  that  New  England  was  a  stronghold  of  secession  and 
of  nullification. 

In  1789,  both  sections  believed  that  the  states  were  inde- 
pendent sovereignties,  and  that  the  Union  was  a  league,  a 
compact.  Massachusetts  so  regarded  it.  In  1804,  ner  legis- 
lature, in  asserting  the  right  of  secession,  refers  to  the  Union 
as  a  compact.  About  thirty  years  later,  John  Quincy  Adams, 


THE  HUNDRED  YEARS'  WRANGLE  151 

one  of  her  greatest  men,  so  regarded  it.  In  a  memorial  to 
Congress  by  several  Northern  members,  who  were  vehe- 
mently opposed  to  the  proposed  annexation  of  Texas, 
Adams,  the  head  of  the  committee,  said  that  annexation 
would  be  "a  violation  of  our  national  compact"  and  "would 
be  identical  with  dissolution."  Webster,  also,  in  his  riper 
years,  used  the  word  compact.  After  a  while,  this  view  be- 
came almost  entirely  localized  in  the  South,  and  the  North 
adopted  the  consolidation  view  of  the  government.  No 
union  could  have  been  formed,  if  the  idea  of  an  indissoluble 
union  had  been  emphasized.  As  we  shall  see  later,  both  sec- 
tions believed  that  a  state  might  secede  whenever  she,  not 
others,  thought  that  her  rights  were  violated  or  her  interests 
endangered. 

After  a  while,  the  North  dropped  the  league  or  compact 
theory,  except  when  it  suited  some  state  like  Massachusetts 
or  a  group  of  states — New  England,  for  instance, — to  go 
back  to  it.  The  South,  on  the  other  hand,  held  on  to  this 
theory  consistently.  She  argued  that  thirteen  sovereign  and 
independent  states  had  carried  on  war  with  England ;  that 
these  same  sovereign  states  had  drawn  up  the  Articles  of 
Confederation,  under  which  our  fathers  lived  from  1781  to 
1788;  that  thirteen  separate  states  had  been  recognized  as 
free  and  independent  in  1783  by  England,  France,  and 
other  nations ;  and  that  nine  of  these  states,  acting  as  states, 
withdrew  or  seceded  from  the  union  of  1781,  and  set  up  the 
new  union  of  1789.  So  that  the  South  knew  that  the  states 
were  older  than  the  Union,  and  believed  that  a  man's  first 
loyalty,  his  "paramount  allegiance,"  was  due  his  state,  not 
the  Federal  government-. 


152  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

This  led  to  a  state  pride  for  which  the  older  Southern 
states  have  ever  been  distinguished,  which  few  Northern 
states  except  Massachusetts  have  ever  understood,  and  of 
which  two-thirds  of  the  states  know  as  little  as  they  do  of 
Sanskrit.  This  state  pride  is  still  very  strong  in  some  South- 
ern states.  In  earlier  periods  it  was  very  intense,  especially 
in  South  Carolina  and  Virginia.  It  pervades  the  literature 
of  the  South,  and  influenced  the  views  of  the  people  beyond 
all  calculation.  It  led  John  Randolph  of  Roanoke  to  scream 
in  his  shrill  tones  across  the  halls  of  Congress,  "When  I 
speak  of  my  country,  sir,  I  mean  Virginia ;"  led  the  noblest 
men  of  the  South,  with  few  exceptions,  to  "go  with  their 
states"  in  the  great  war  between  the  sections;  and  lent  keen- 
ness to  the  sword  of  Lee,  as  it  flashed  "forth  from  its  scab- 
bard, pure  and  bright,"  "beneath  Virginia's  sky." 

In  believing  that  the  states  are  older  than  the  Union, 
Massachusetts  was  not  behind  her  Southern  sisters.  As  late 
as  1845,  a  prominent  committee  of  the  General  Court  (leg- 
islature) of  Massachusetts  said :  "She  (Massachusetts)  can- 
not forget  that  she  had  an  independent  existence  before  the 
Union  was  formed."  This  fact,  however,  was  long  denied 
by  the  politicians  and  the  publicists  of  New  England ;  but  oc- 
casionally a  candid  writer  of  that  section  admits  it.  George 
Bancroft,  the  eminent  Northern  historian,  says,  "The  states, 
as  they  gave  life  to  the  Union,  are  necessary  to  the  contin- 
uance of  that  life."  George  Clinton,  the  eminent  soldier  and 
statesman  of  New  York,  said:  "The  sovereignty  of  the 
states,  I  consider  the  only  stable  security  for  the  liberties  of 
the  people  against  the  encroachment  of  power." 


THE  HUNDRED  YEARS'  WRANGLE  153 

The  young  men  of  the  South  were  taught  to  watch  the 
Federal  government.  There  was  a  deep-seated  fear  that  the 
general  government  might  assume  so  much  power  as  to  re- 
duce the  states  to  mere  counties  of  the  Union,  as  Lincoln 
actually  regarded  them.  This  feeling  was  very  strong  in  the 
South,  and  was  confined  to  no  political  party.  Jefferson 
Davis  was  trained  under  this  nervous  dread  of  encroachment 
upon  the  rights  of  the  states.  For  the  sake  of  his  state, 
Mississippi,  he  was  willing  to  crucify  personal  ambition.  In 
1846,  for  example,  when  the  war  with  Mexico  began,  Con- 
gress authorized  the  president  to  appoint  two  new  major- 
generals  and  four  brigadier-generals,  and  Mr.  Davis,  al- 
ready well-known  as  a  soldier,  was  offered  one  of  the  ap- 
pointments. He,  however,  declined  on  the  ground  that  such 
appointments  were  unconstitutional  and  that  state  troops 
mustered  out  for  the  national  defense  should  be  commanded 
by  officers  either  elected  by  the  troops  or  appointed  by  the 
governor. 

"A  bargain  broken  on  one  side  is  broken  on  both  sides," 
said  Webster  in  speaking  of  the  compact  between  the  states. 
For  decades  the  whole  South  and  a  large  part  of  the  North 
believed  in  the  league  or  compact  theory  and  in  its  corollary, 
the  right  of  secession.  When  the  North  broke  her  "bargain" 
by  interfering  in  many  ways  with  the  rights  and  the  property 
interests  of  the  South,  the  South  accepted  all  kinds  of  com- 
promises, instead  of  fighting  forty  years  earlier  than  she  did. 
When  she  did  fight,  the  North  and  the  West  united  solidly 
against  her.  The  odds  and  the  world  were  against  her. 

(b)  THE  PARTNERSHIP  VIEW 

Again,  the  South  regarded  the  Union  as  a  partnership,  as 


154  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

what  is  called  in  the  business  world  a  "limited  partnership." 
Each  state  contributed  a  part  of  her  sovereignty.  She  re- 
served all  such  rights  as  were  not  specified  in  the  terms  of 
agreement,  these  terms  being  set  forth  in  a  paper  already 
familiar  to  the  reader  as  the  Federal  constitution,  adopted 
in  1787.  "Reserved  rights"  was  a  common  phrase  in  South- 
ern political  language.  Foremost  among  these  reserved 
rights,  but  to  be  exercised  only  as  a  last  resort,  was  the  right 
of  secession.  The  South  did  not  wish  to  secede.  She  always 
loved  and  honored  the  Union  which  she  had  done  so  much 
to  create  and  to  defend.  The  right  to  secede,  that  is,  to  with- 
draw from  the  Union,  she  reserved  as  a  last  desperate  meas- 
ure of  self-defense,  just  as  every  man  feels  that,  in  some 
great  emergency,  to  save  his  own  life,  he  might  possibly  use 
a  pistol  against  some  human  being. 

So  it  is  in  a  partnership.  Men  do  not  contribute  their 
capital  and  their  services  to  go  into  a  partnership  that  cannot 
be  dissolved.  If  the  partners  differ  so  widely  on  questions  of 
management  that  they  cannot  cooperate  pleasantly,  they 
dissolve.  If  one  partner  continues  to  overdraw  his  share  of 
the  profits,  they  dissolve.  If  one  partner  adopts  methods  that 
injure  the  standing  and  the  reputation  of  the  others,  a  dis- 
solution can  be  demanded.  So  with  the  sovereign  states  that 
formed  the  Union  in  1789.  Our  fathers  believed  that,  if  the 
powers  granted  by  the  states  to  the  Union  should  be  used 
to  the  injury  of  the  states,  the  states  themselves  being  the 
judges  as  to  the  extent  of  the  injury,  they  might  secede  fron; 
the  Union;  and  many  eminent  Northern  authorities  admit 
that  on  no  other  terms  could  the  constitution  of  1787  ever 
have  been  ratified.  Three  states,  Virginia,  New  York,  and 


THE  HUNDRED  YEARS'  WRANGLE  155 

Rhode  Island,  adopted  it  on  those  express  terms,  and  others 
inferred  that  there  was  no  objection  to  the  proviso,  as  no 
state  made  such  objection. 

Nor  was  the  partnership  view  of  the  Union  confined  to 
any  one  section.  For  instance,  Josiah  Quincy,  the  famous 
statesman  and  publicist  of  New  England,  applied  the  term 
partnership  to  the  Federal  government  in  a  speech  in  Con- 
gress in  1811.  This,  by  the  way,  was  the  first  secession 
speech*  ever  heard  in  that  body. 

The  states,  then,  were  thirty-four  partners.  Fifteen  of 
them  held  property  in  slaves;  the  rest  had  sold  out  their 
holdings.  The  nineteen  not  only  condemned  the  fifteen,  but 
declared  that  owners  of  slaves  should  not  take  their  slaves 
into  the  common  possession  of  the  partnership — that  is,  the 
territories  acquired  by  the  blood  and  money  of  all  the  part- 
ners. 

Again:  the  nineteen  passed  laws  declaring  that,  if  any 
partner  traveled  with  his  s'aves  through  the  land  owned  by 
any  partner  not  holding  slaves,  the  slaves  thereupon  be- 
came free.  This  law  was  upset  by  the  Supreme  Court  of  the 
United  States. 

The  nineteen  went  still  farther.  In  1860,  they  elected  as 
president  a  man  who  had  said  in  his  speeches  that  this  coun- 
try could  not  remain  half  free  and  half  slave,  regardless  of 
the  fact  that  the  institution  was  recognized  in  the  terms  of 
partnership,  or  constitution,  and  that  the  Union  had  been  for 
nearly  seventy-five  years  cherishing  it  and  protecting  it. 

All  these  things  were  palpable  violations  of  the  equity 
that  underlies  all  partnerships,  and  were  regarded  by  the 

*See  page  183. 


156  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

"cotton  states"  as  justifying  their  withdrawal  from  the 
Union.  Four  other  states  waited,  hoping  for  a  reconcilia- 
tion. In  the  spring  of  1861,  however,  when  Mr.  Lincoln 
called  for  troops,  these  four  refused  to  march  upon  their 
Southern  sisters,  and,  rather  than  do  so,  joined  the  Southern 
Confederacy.  It  is  clear  then  that  there  were  two  separate 
secession  movements. 

(C)  FEDERALISTS  AND  ANTI-FEDERALISTS 

Very  soon  after  the  adoption  of  the  constitution  (1787), 
there  sprang  up  two  parties  holding  opposite  views  of  that 
paper.  One  believed  in  consolidation,  centralization  of 
power,  at  the  Federal  capital;  the  other  wished  to  guard 
carefully  the  rights  of  the  states,  make  the  Federal  govern- 
ment the  "general  agent"  of  the  states,  in  order  to  collect 
revenue,  to  keep  the  states  from  trespassing  upon  each 
other's  rights,  and  to  present  a  united  front  against  inter- 
ference from  foreign  nations. 

The  party  last  referred  to  was  especially  strong  in  the 
South.  Among  its  earliest  leaders  were  Henry,  Mason, 
Monroe,  and  Jefferson ;  and  later  this  party,  led  by  Jefferson, 
swept  the  country  and  held  sway  for  over  half  a  century.  In 
still  later  periods,  its  leaders'  were  such  men  as  John  Ran- 
dolph of  Roanoke,  John  C.  Calhoun,  and  Jefferson  Davis. 

This  party  believed  firmly  in  the  right  of  secession.  Some 
of  them,  Jefferson,  Madison,  and  Calhoun,  for  instance,  be- 
lieved in  nullification,  that  is,  the  right  of  a  state  to  set  aside 
a  law  of  Congress  trespassing  upon  her  rights  as  a  mem- 
ber of  the  Federal  Union. 


THE  HUNDRED  YEARS'  WRANGLE  157 

The  other,  or  consolidation,  view  of  the  constitution  was 
very  strong  in  the  North.  There  it  was  learned  by  thousands 
of  European  settlers,  and  by  them  was  spread  throughout 
the  Western  and  Northwestern  states,  until  it  became  the 
prevailing  view  of  the  American  people,  and  put  the  states- 
rights  people  in  a  minority.  Thus  the  South  came  to  stand 
politically  almost  alone,  cut  off  from  the  rest  of  the  Union. 
The  North  also  forgot  that  thirteen  separate  colonies  had 
rebelled  against  England,  declared  themselves  independent, 
sovereign  states,  been  recognized  as  such  by  European  na- 
tions, established  a  confederacy  in  1781,  seceded  from  that 
in  1788,  and  adopted  a  new  constitution  by  the  votes  of 
separate  state  conventions.  Forgetting  all  this,  the  North 
came  to  ridicule  the  idea  of  state  sovereignty,  and  her  over- 
whelming numbers  have  enabled  her  to  make  this  idea  seem 
now  almost  ridiculous. 

The  two  parties  referred  to  above  were  called  Federalist 
and  Anti-Federalist.  They  were  by  no  means  sectional  or 
geographical.  There  were  no  more  zealous  Federalists  any- 
where than  John  Marshall,  Charles  Cotesworth  Pinckney, 
and  George  Washington. 

In  1801,  the  Anti-Federalists  made  Jefferson  president. 
Their  name  about  this  time  wTas  changed ;  they  called  them- 
selves Republicans,  while  their  opponents  nicknamed  them 
Democrats. 

When  elevated  to  the  presidency,  Jefferson  was  well 
known  to  believe  in  nullification,  that  is,  the  right  of  a  state 
to  declare  a  Federal  law  null  and  void  within  her  borders, 
and  also  to  be  in  favor  of  limiting  slavery  to  the  old  states 


158  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

in  which  it  already  existed.  His  doctrine  of  nullification 
was  never  popular.  His  other  doctrine  was  afterwards 
adopted  by  the  abolition,  free-soil,  antislavery,  and  South- 
liating  politicians,  and  did  a  great  deal  to  bring  on  the  war 
between  the  sections. 

John  Marshall,  also,  unconsciously  forged  chains  to  bind 
his  state  and  his  people.  Selected  as  chief- justice  by  John 
Adams,  the  retiring  Federalist  president,  this  great  Virgin- 
ian interpreted  the  constitution  in  such  a  way  as  to  make 
himself  one  of  the  few  Southern  men  that  have  never  been 
abused  by  billingsgate  orators  of  the  North,  and  claptrap 
professors  of  history.  Alas,  how  limited  is  human  vision! 
If  this  august  Virginian  could  have  foreseen  that  he  was  to 
be  quoted  by  men  hurling  scorn  and  contempt  at  Virginia, 
he  would  have  rejected  the  seductive  offers  of  Adams,  and 
like  Moses  of  old  would  have  refused  to  be  called  the  son  of 
Pharaoh's  daughter. 

II 
Later  Causes  of  Estrangement 

These  different  views  of  the  constitution  were,  as  already 
said,  by  no  means  entirely  sectional.  Some  of  the  ablest  men 
of  the  South  were  Federalists,  that  is,  believed  in  a  strong 
centralized  government;  but  the  anti-Federal  ideas  of 
Thomas  Jefferson  were  far  more  popular,  swept  the  country, 
and  in  1801  put  him  into  the  presidential  chair. 

These  differences  of  opinion  alone  might  not  have  led  to 
sectional  bitterness.  Soon  the  question  of  tariff  thrust  its- 


THE  HUNDRED  YEARS'  WRANGLE  159 

self  into  politics,  and  the  agricultural  interests  of  the  South 
were  seriously  overlooked  by  Congress  in  legislating  for  the 
commercial  interests  of  other  sections.  This  produced  an  in- 
tense  feeling,  and  led  South  Carolina  to  threaten  in  1832  to 
"nullify,"  that  is,  to  declare  the  tariff  laws  of  Congress  null 
and  void  in  South  Carolina.  The  planters  of  the  South 
wanted  a  low  tariff.  The  manufacturers  of  the  North 
wanted  a  tariff  high  enough  to  protect  their  manufactures, 
that  is,  to  keep  them  from  being  undersold  by  foreigners 
shipping  to  this  country.  These  opposing  needs  helped  to 
create  bitterness  between  the  sections. 

In  this  connection  we  should  mention  the  scheme  of  many 
Northern  statesmen  to  surrender  the  right  of  navigating  the 
lower  Mississippi  in  exchange  for  a  favorable  commercial 
treaty  with  Spain,  then  our  next  door  neighbor  to  the  south- 
ward. This  angered  the  South  beyond  expression,  and  very 
naturally.  Mr.  Theodore  Roosevelt,  in  his  Winning  of  the 
West,  tells  us  that  the  statesmen  of  the  North  "thought  more 
of  our  right  to  the  North  Atlantic  fisheries  than  of  our  own- 
ership of  the  Mississippi  valley."  So  we  ses  that  com- 
mercial jealousy  helped  to  increase  sectional  animosity. 

Territorial  expansion,  also,  caused  no  little  jealousy  be- 
tween the  sections.  The  manufacturing  states  were  not  will- 
ing to  see  new  territory  added  to  the  agricultural  sections  of 
the  country,  and  very  loud  threats  of  secession  were  made 
by  New  England  when  Louisiana,  Texas,  and  New  Mexico 
were  added  in  that  direction.  This,  however,  was  partly  due 
to  other  causes.  It  was  due  partly  to  the  "balance  of  power" 
between  the  sections.  It  was  feared  that,  when  these  terri- 


160  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

tones  were  made  states,  the  South  might  have  too  much 
power  in  the  senate.  Moreover,  when  Texas  was  admitted 
to  the  Union,  there  came  in  another  very  warm  question  to 
complicate  matters  and  make  some  sections  bitterly  opposed 
to  annexation ;  viz.,  the  slavery  question. 

The  South,  after  a  while,  found  herself  in  the  minority  on 
most  great  questions.  Immigration  did  not  seek  her  shores 
at  all  generally.  New  states  began  to  fill  up  with  foreigners 
and  writh  settlers  from  the  old  states  of  the  north  Atlantic 
seaboard.  In  Congress,  the  South  was  outvoted  on  many 
important  issues.  The  majority  vote  seemed  to  her  to  be  un- 
friendly to  her  interests,  to  work  against  her  and  for  other 
sections,  not  only  in  the  tariff  question,  but  in  "bounties"  of 
various  kinds,  encouraging  other  sections  in  their  favorite 
schemes  to  her  injury;  in  selling  the  public  lands  for  the 
benefit  of  other  sections ;  in  establishing  more  dockyards  in 
the  North  than  was  equitable ;  in  giving  Southern  states  a 
very  small  proportion  of  the  money  voted  for  coast  de- 
fenses; and  in  many  other  matters  calculated  to  make  her 
feel  like  the  stepchild  of  the  republic. 

Again,  another  danger  threatened  her.  As  foreigners 
filled  up  the  new  states  and  adopted  the  national,  the  con- 
solidation, view  of  the  government,  held  so  generally  by  the 
Northern  men  they  were  thrown  with,  the  South  felt  that 
her  Union,  the  Union  of  the  fathers,  was  passing  away ;  and 
that  she  would  be  far  happier  if  she  could  have  a.  republic 
of  her  own  and  not  be  lost  as  a  part  of  a  consolidated  nation. 

Such  sorrows  the  South  had  in  those  ante-bellum  days. 
Yet  many  of  our  people  loved  the  Union  too  dearly  to  think 


JEFFERSON  DAVIS 


THE  HUNDRED  YEARS'  WRANGLE  161 

of  leaving  it.  Nearly  all  these  questions  were,  from  time  to 
time,  adjusted  or  compromised  by  statesmen  of  the  two 
sections.  There  was  one  question,  however,  which  would 
not  be  settled,  which,  like  Banquo's  ghost,  would  not  down ; 
or  if  compromised  at  this  or  that  time  would,  like  the  ghost, 
appear  at  the  feast  to  bring  terror  to  the  guests.  This  was 
the  slavery  question.  It  was  this  that  proved  to  be  the  oc- 
casion, the  precipitating  cause,  of  the  great  war  between  the 
North  and  the  South. 

This  subject  we  reserve  for  our  next  section.  Just  here, 
however,  we  pause  to  say  that  the  North,  not  being  able  to 
make  much  use  of  slave  labor,  was  sometime  ahead  of  the 
South  in  the  idea  of  abolishing  slavery ;  and  fanatical  aboli- 
tionists and  scheming  politicians  dragged  the  question  into 
politics,  insulted  and  vilified  the  slave-owners  of  the  South, 
and  thus  brought  estrangement  between  the  sections.  Thus, 
various  causes  were  adding  to  the  bad  feeling  between  the 
North  and  the  South,  until  it  culminated  in  the  great  war  of 
secession  (1861-1865). 

Another  cause  of  sorrow  to  the  South  was  the  continual 
violation  of  the  constitution  on  the  part  of  many  states.  The 
South  stuck  to  the  letter  of  the  constitution.  Most  of  her 
great  leaders  were  "strict  constructionists ;"  and,  as  long  as 
the  Southern  states  belonged  to  the  Federal  Union,  as  long 
as  they  were  members  of  this  great  partnership,  most  of  her 
people  felt  that  the  several  states  should  enforce  the  laws 
passed  by  Congress  and  not  declared  unconstitutional  by  the 
Supreme  Court.  A  few  people  believed  differently;  but  the 
doctrine  of  nullification  was  never  popular  with  the  South 
11 


162  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

as  a  whole.  She  saw  many  Northern  states,  however,  dis- 
obeying the  constitution,  nullifying  acts  of  Congress,  that  is, 
refusing  to  enforce  laws  of  Congress,  and  even  passing  bills 
of  their  own  in  direct  opposition  to  acts  of  Congress.  Many 
of  these  bills  were  aimed  at  the  South  and  her  domestic  in- 
stitutions, their  special  object  being  to  get  rid  of  African 
slavery  by  any  means  whatsoever.  After  1850,  no  less  than 
fourteen  states  thus  nullified  one  bill  based  upon  the  consti- 
tution. 

Ill 

The  Greatest  Cause  of  Estrangement 

(i)  SLAVERY  IN  THE  NORTH  AND  THE  SOUTH 

A  few  slaves  were  landed  at  Jamestown  in  1619  and 
sold  to  the  planters.  These  excited  little  interest  and  no 
ill-feeling.  At  that  time.,  slavery  was  common  in  the 
whole  civilized  world,  even  kings  and  queens  being  part- 
ners in  the  slave  trade.  In  1650,  there  were  only  300  ne- 
groes in  Virginia. 

Meanwhile,  in  New  England  slavery  was  becoming  well 
established.  Indians  captured  in  the  Pequot  wars  were  sold 
into  slavery,  husbands  and  wives  being  sold  to  different  mas- 
ters, often  at  remote  distances.  Some  were  burned  at  the 
stake,  says  Morris,*  the  Northern  historian.  In  1641,  when 
the  first  Massachusetts  code  of  laws  was  drafted,  there  was 
enacted  the  first  statute  establishing  slavery  in  America. 

Slavery   spread1  slowly   in   Virginia.     White   "indented 

* History  of  the  United  States,  page  472.    (Edition  of  1898.) 


THE  HUNDRED  YEARS'  WRANGLE  163 

servants,"  redemptioners,  and  apprentices  were  numerous 
and  cheap,  and  African  slaves  were  not  especially  welcome. 
In  1663,  however,  the  English  government  chartered  the 
Royal  African  Society,  of  which  James,  Duke  of  York,  af- 
terwards King  James  II,  was  president.  This  society,  sup- 
ported by  the  English  government,  forced  the  African  slaves 
upon  the  unwilling  Virginians,  who  then  and  afterwards 
made  noble  efforts  to  stop  the  traffic  in  human  beings. 

Says  a  well  known  Virginia  writer  :*  "Virginia,  as  a  col- 
ony, passed  twenty-three  acts  to  stop  the  slave  trade.  She 
was  the  first  nation  (sic)  in  the  world  to  prohibit  it.  In 
1782,  she  passed  the  act  permitting  the  manumission  of 
slaves.  It  was  under  her  presidents  that  the  slave  trade  was 
declared  piracy.  It  was  C.  F.  Mercer,  a  Virginian,  who  se- 
cured the  passage  of  a  resolution  that  proposed  to  concede 
to  Great  Britain  the  mutual  right  of  search  of  vessels  sus- 
pected of  slave  trading.  Throughout  the  period  from  1776 
to  1832,  the  subject  of  emancipation  engaged  the  attention 
of  Virginians.  Judge  St.  George  Tucker  and  Thomas  R. 
Dew,  among  others,  proposed  schemes  for  emancipation  be- 
fore the  Legislature.  And,  that  same  year,  John  Tyler  pro- 
posed to  abolish  the  slave  trad 2  in  the  District"  (of  Co- 
lumbia.) 

The  noble  efforts  of  colonial  Virginia  were  balked  by 
England.  Some  English  noblemen  and  kings  were  waxing 
rich  on  the  traffic  in  slaves,  and  the  acts  of  the  Virginia 
Burgesses  were  vetoed  by  royal  governors  and  by  monarchs. 

South  Carolina  was  more  willing  to  receive  the  Africans. 
Her  fields  were  so  malarious  that  white  men  could  not  work 


•Lyon  G.  Tyler  in  his  Tylers. 


164  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

them  without  great  risk  to  health  and  life,  and  no  one 
thought  of  blaming  her  for  buying  slaves  from  the  English 
and  New  England  dealers. 

In  the  eighteenth  century,  slavery  took  deep  root  in 
America,  both  north  and  south.  By  1740,  about  130,000 
Africans  had  been  brought  over;  by  1776,  more  than  300,- 
ooo ;  by  natural  increase,  they  numbered  probably  500,000  at 
the  time  of  the  Declaration  of  Independence.  At  that  time 
slavery  existed  in  all  the  thirteen  colonies.  A  feeling  against 
the  slave  trade  had  long  existed  in  some  quarters,  and  in 
1769  the  Virginia  House  of  Burgesses  had  made  an  effort  to 
stop  it  in  so  far  as  it  affected  Virginia ;  and  George  III,  in 
the  interests  of  English  commerce,  commanded  the  royal 
governor  of  Virginia  to  veto  the  measure.  The  slave  trade 
was  very  objectionable  to  the  people  of  Maryland,  Virginia, 
•North  Carolina,  and  South  Carolina.  While  there  was  no 
widespread  objection  to  slavery,  yet  the  whole  world  was  ris- 
ing up  against  the  slave  trade.  This  "infernal  traffic,"  as 
George  Mason  called  it,  led  to  the  kidnapping  of  negroes  in 
Africa  and  of  whites  in  Europe,  and  excited  the  sympathy  of 
mankind.  In  1815,  the  congress  of  European  nations  at  Vi- 
enna declared  against  the  slave  trade,  and  denounced  it  as 
riracy.  Against  it,  too,  many  American  statesmen  of  1787 
raised  their  voices,  and  wished  to  prohibit  it  in  the  constitu- 
tion. Alas !  "self  is  all  in  all."  By  a  combination  between 
some  Northern  men  who  wished  to  encourage  the  carrying 
and  the  selling  of  slaves,  and  some  Southern  men  who 
wished  to  stock  Southern  plantations,  the  slave  trade  was 
given  twenty  years'  extension;  and  "thereby  hangs  a  tale." 


THE  HUNDRED  YEARS'  WRANGLE  165 

(2)  THE  NORTH  SELLS  OUT 

After  the  Declaration  of  Independence  was  adopted,  a 
good  many  Americans  began  to  favor  emancipation.  The 
Northern  states,  which  had  only  40,000  of  the  700,000 
slaves,  were  especially  willing  to  free  the  negro.  Some  of 
the  states  freed  their  slaves  at  one  time;  others,  gradually. 
All  of  the  Northern  states  freed  the  slaves  between  1777 
and  1804;  but  a  great  many  owners  sold  their  slaves  to 
Southern  planters  in  full  time  to  avoid  all  financial  loss  by 
emancipation. 

The  1 8th  century  was,  as  said  elsewhere,  heartless  and 
brutal.  In  England,  parliamentary  votes  could  be  bought 
easily  and  cheap  for  cash  or  for  titles.  Sir  Robert  Walpole, 
the  first  prime  minister,  invented  the  phrase,  "Every  man 
has  his  price;"  and  he  had  good  reason  to  believe  it. 

In  America,  in  that  century,  there  was  much  brutality  in 
the  treatment  of  slaves.  Even  in  New  England,  slave  fam- 
ilies were  often  separated.  Young  infants  interfered  so 
much  with  the  usefulness  of  the  mothers  that  they  were 
given  away  just  as  puppies  are  in  our  day.*  New  England 
stopped  rearing  slaves  because  it  was  cheaper  to  buy  them. 
White  bondmen,  "redemptioners,"  were  a  drug  on  the  mar- 
ket. They  were  sold  into  slavery  for  a  term  of  years  to  pay 
their  passage  across  the  ocean. 

In  the  1 8th  century,  there  were  several  slave  insurrections. 
In  1712,  some  of  the  slaves  of  New  York  city  rose  up  against 
their  masters.  They  were  punished  very  severely,  some  very 

*Dr.  Guy  Carleton  Lee. 


166  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

cruelly,  twenty-four  being  executed.  In  1740,  an  uprising 
in  South  Carolina  had  to  be  quelled  by  force  of  arms.  The 
slaves  there  were  always  more  dangerous  than  those  far- 
ther north,  and  the  influence  of  barbarous  negroes  from  the 
West  Indies  made  the  Carolinians  exceedingly  nervous  and 
anxious.  In  1741,  the  slaves  in  New  York  city  again  at- 
tempted an  uprising.  Thirty-three  of  them  were  executed, 
thirteen  by  burning.* 

Emancipation  ideas  began  in  1688  with  the  Quakers  of 
Pennsylvania.  These  ideas  did  not  spread  quickly  to  Vir- 
ginia or  New  England.  Between  1767  and  1774,  however, 
many  people  in  Massachusetts  tried  to  abolish  slavery;  but 
the  royal  governors  would  not  sanction  the  movement.  In 
1769,  as  seen  already,  a  like  movement  was  suppressed  by 
the  governor  of  Virginia  acting  under  explicit  orders  from 
George  III.  England  would  not  give  up  so  valuable  a 
branch  of  commerce. 

When  independence  was  brewing,  Congress  made  a  move 
towards  abolishing  the  slave  trade.  On  April  6/1776,  the 
Continental  Congress  resolved  "that  no  slaves  should  be  im- 
ported into  any  of  the  thirteen  colonies."  It  is  needless  to 
add  that  this  law  was  constantly  evaded  by  English  and 
Northern  slave  importers. 

In  1784,  after  independence  had  been  achieved,  Congress 
again  discussed  the  slavery  question.  It  came  within  one 
vote  of  deciding  that  after  the  year  1800  slavery  should  be 
excluded  from  all  the  territory  west  of  the  states  then  ex- 
isting, and  above  31  degrees  north  latitude.  This,  if  passed, 

*Charles  Morris's  History  of  United  States. 


THE  HUNDRED  YEARS'  WRANGLE  167 

would  have  nipped  the  slavery  question  in  the  bud;  but,  if 
the  war  was  "inevitable,"  as  some  say  in  their  books,  the 
contest  would  have  come  on  some  other  issue. 

In  1787,  Congress  passed  the  ordinance  for  the  govern- 
ment of  the  Northwest  Territory,  in  which  slavery  was  for- 
ever excluded  from  that  section.  Not  only  did  Virginia 
surrender  a  queenly  domain  conquered  by  George  Rogers 
Clark  and  other  sons,  but  she  voted  for  the  exclusion  of 
slavery  from  the  territory,  so  great  was  her  desire  to  please 
her  sister  states  of  the  Union.  Maryland  and  Georgia  like- 
wise ceded  their  claims  to  the  general  government.  One 
clause  of  this  ordinance  guaranteed  the  seizure  and  return  of 
runaway  slaves.  This  same  clause  was,  as  said  elsewhere, 
incorporated  in  the  Federal  constitution  of  1787;  and  its 
continued  violation  was,  as  said  already,  one  of  the  South's 
sorest  trials  for  three-quarters  of  a  century. 

This  "self-denying  ordinance"  did  not  satisfy  the  Penn- 
sylvania Quakers.  In  1790,  they  petitioned  Congress  to 
suppress  the  foreign  slave  trade,  and  to  take  steps  towards 
emancipating  the  negroes.  As  to  the  first,  Congress  referred 
them  to  article  i,  section  9,  paragraph  I,  of  the  constitution. 
As  to  the  second,  Congress  resolved  that  the  question  of 
domestic  slavery  must  be  left  to  the  individual  states  to 
settle. 

(3)  "WHO  DID  SIN  ?" 

In  1787,  the  slavery  question  came  near  breaking  up  the 
Union.  Many  Northern  men  said  that  they  would  not  take 
their  states  into  the  proposed  Union  if  the  slave  population 


168  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

of  the  South  was  to  be  counted  in  fixing  representation  in 
Congress.  This  led  to  the  so-called  "Federal  ratio,"  by 
which  five  slaves  were  counted  as  three  persons  in  the  popu- 
lation. Another  trouble  was  the  strong  desire  among  both 
Northern  and  Southern  members  of  the  convention  to  put 
a  stop  to  the  slave  trade.  This  was  settled  by  giving  the 
traffic  twenty  years'  respite;  during  which  time,  Northern 
owners  sold  out  to  the  Southern  planters.  The  third  burn- 
ing question  was  how  to  get  runaway  slaves  back  to  their 
masters.  To  meet  this,  article  iv,  section  2,  paragraph  3, 
was  put  in  the  constitution;  and  Fugitive  Slave  laws  based 
upon  it  were  afterwards  passed  by  Congress,  only  to  be  ig- 
nored or  violated. 

All  these  compromises  proved  disastrous.  The  "three 
fifths  clause"  continually  tempted  the  South  to  encourage  the 
importation  of  negroes,  so  as  to  give  larger  representation 
in  Congress,  and  it  lent  wings  to  the  numerous  slave  ships 
owned  by  English  and  Northern  slave  traders.  The  twenty 
years'  respite,  accordingly,  saw  an  enormous  increase  in  the 
number  of  Africans  brought  to  America.  The  "runaway" 
clause  led  to  untold  bitterness  between  the  sections,  because 
of  its  continued  and  flagrant  violations. 

Very  few  people  of  those  earlier  eras  regarded  slavery  as 
morally  wrong.  Jonathan  Edwards,  the  great  theologian, 
owned  slaves.  Whitefield,  the  great  Methodist  divine,  left 
seventy-five  to  a  devout  sister  of  his  communion.  Gen. 
Anthony  Wayne,  of  Pennsylvania,  had  a  plantation  in 
Georgia  stocked  with  negroes.  In  colonial  New  England,  a 
"godly  Newport  elder  always  returned  thanks,  on  the  Sun- 


THE  HUNDRED  YEARS'  WRANGLE  169 

day  following  the  arrival  of  a  slave  ship  in  the  harbor  of 
Newport,  that  an  overruling  Providence  has  been  pleased  to 
bring  to  this  land  of  freedom  another  cargo  of  benighted 
heathen  to  enjoy  the  blessings  of  a  Gospel  dispensation!" 
At  a  later  day,  some  of  the  leading  thinkers  of  all  sections 
were  in  favor  of  getting  rid  of  slavery,  among  them  Thomas 
Jefferson,  George  Washington,  John  Marshall,  Hugh  Wil- 
liamson, George  Wythe,  Luther  Martin,  and  William  Pinck- 
ney. 

Among  later  leaders  of  thought,  we  find  such  men  as 
Francis.  Scott  Key,  John  Eager  Howard,  Bishop  William 
Meade,  James  Monroe,  G.  W.  P.  Custis,  Wm.  C.  Rives, 
Henry  Clay,  and  John  Randolph.  All  these  men  were,  how- 
ever, ahead  of  public  opinion.  Neither  the  North  nor  the 
South  as  a  whole  condemned  slavery  just  after  the  Revo- 
lution. We  may  add,  also,  that  the  leaders  referred  to  could 
never  solve  the  great  problem  as  to  what  should  be  done 
with  the  slave  after  he  had  his  freedom.  The  Colonization 
Society  sent  a  few  to  Africa ;  but  they  were  a  mere  drop  in 
the  bucket..  The  North  got  rid  of  her  slaves  by  selling  them 
to  negro  traders  who  bought  them  for  the  Southern  planters. 

To  censure  our  ancestors  for  not  abolishing  slavery  before 
1800  would  be  preposterous,  would  be  a  moral  anachronism. 
As  well  censure  Washington  for  not  using  the  telegraph  or 
the  telephone.  England  did  not  abolish  slavery  at  home  till 
^1772;  and  in  her  colonies,  till  1834.  If  it  took  her  a  thou- 
sand years,  how  shall  America  be  blamed  for  not  doing  it  in 
two  hundred? 

The  idea  of  emancipation  took  root  slowly.     As  already 


170  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

said,  the  leaders  were  far  ahead  of  the  people.  If  left  alone, 
Virginia  might  have  shown  her  Southern  sisters  the  way  to 
settle  the  slavery  problem.  Her  constitutional  convention 
of  1829,  one  of  the  greatest  bodies  that  ever  sat  in  America, 
came  very  near  voting  for  "prospective  emancipation."  In 
1831-1832,  the  legislature  debated  the  slavery  question,  and 
came  near  taking  some  decisive  measures  towards  emancipa- 
tion. In  1827,  North  Carolina  had  a  strong  leaning  in  the 
same  direction.  Georgia  was  the  first  state  to  prohibit  the 
slave  trade  in  its  constitution.  Many  earnest  people  in  the 
South ,  longed  to  see  slavery  abolished.  Great  problems, 
however,  presented  themselves  in  that  connection;  and,  be- 
fore the  South  had  time  to  think,  there  came  a  shriek  from 
the  fanatics,  that  slavery  must  be  abolished  immediately,  re- 
gardless of  property  rights,  regardless  of  the  constitution, 
regardless  of  the  fearful  convulsions  that  would  come  upon 
the  whole  fabric  of  Southern  civilization.  Of  these  anarch- 
ists of  freedom,  we  shall  speak  in  a  later  chapter.  They 
and  their  followers  urged  the  slaves  of  the  South  to  rise  and 
slay,  watch  their  masters  turn  pale  and  tremble  as  the  smoke 
of  their  dwellings  ascended  to  the  skies ;  and  these  modern 
crusaders  hailed  the  dawn  of  a  political  and  moral  millen- 
nium which  they  saw  approaching.* 

The  attacks  of  the  abolitionists  enraged  the  South.  The 
idea  of  emancipation  and  of  colonization  soon  vanished.  In- 
stead of  discussing  these  any  longer,  the  South  fell  back 
upon  her  rights  under  the  constitution,  where  slavery  was 
clearly  recognized. 


*From  a  speech  made  in  Congress. 


THE  HUNDRED  YEARS'  WRANGLE  171 

Two  things  postponed  indefinitely  the  day  of  peaceable 
emancipation.  One  was  the  invention  of  the  cotton  gin 
( J793)  J tne  other  was  the  rise  of  the  Abolition  party  (about 
1832). 

Up  to  1793,  it  took  a  negro  a  whole  day  to  clean  one 
pound  of  cotton  ready  for  market.  In  the  year  named,  Eli 
Whitney,  of  Massachusetts,  invented  the  cotton  gin,  which 
would  clean  a  thousand  pounds  in  a  day.  The  effects  of  this 
invention  were  incalculable.  By  one  man's  labor,  the  planter 
could  clean  for  market  one  thousand  pounds  where  he  had 
cleaned  five  or  six  before.  Cotton  exports  increased  pro- 
digiously. They  rose  from  189,500  pounds  in  1791  to  41,- 
000,000  pounds  in  1803.  Southern  lands  trebled  in  value. 
Negroes  increased  in  value  proportionately.  Southern  capi- 
tal went  into  cotton  plantations ;  Northern  capital,  into  cot- 
ton factories,  and  into  vessels  for  carrying  the  cotton  to  the 
markets  of  the  world.  Eli  Whitney  thus  laid  the  basis  of  the 
wealth  and  preeminence  of  America.  Unfortunately  and 
innocently,  however,  his  inventive  genius  laid  the  basis  of  the 
South's  wealth  in  negro  slavery ;  for,  from  this  time,  untold 
thousands  of  the  Southern  people,  and  many  Northern  peo- 
ple interested  in  handling  the  cotton,  closed  their  eyes  to  the 
moral  side  of  the  slavery  question.  This  is  human  nature. 
This  is  the  same  human  nature  we  see  around  us  every  day. 
In  our  day,  it  is  ruining  children  in  factories,  grinding  the 
faces  of  the  poor  widow  and  of  the  orphan  by  paying  star- 
vation wages,  and  in  a  hundred  ways  calling  down  the  wrath 
of  a  righteous  Heaven. 

Other  evils  followed  Whitney's  great  invention.     Among 


172  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

them  was  the  increased  violation  of  the  law  against  import- 
ing African  negroes.  Instead  of  stopping  in  1808,  as  the 
constitution  prescribed,  it  went  on,  more  or  less  openly,  for 
years  afterwards.  Both  sections  were  equally  guilty. 

When  President  Jefferson  bought  Louisiana  in  1803, 
trouble  resulted.  The  Northeast  objected  to  adding  so  much 
territory  to  the  South,  and  thus  increasing  her  influence  and 
her  prestige.  Thereupon,  threats  of  secession  came  from 
New  England.  That  section  feared  that  the  addition  of  so 
much  territory  to  the  South  would  endanger  the  commer- 
cial supremacy  of  New  England,  and  create  a  great  trade 
emporium  at  New  Orleans.  Some  conscientious  opponents 
of  slavery,  moreover,  feared  that  the  area  of  slavery  would 
be  greatly  widened.  This,  however,  was  rather  a  minor  in- 
terest. 

Meantime,  the  number  of  slaves  was  increasing  in  the 
South  and  diminishing  elsewhere.  The  climate  of  the  North 
was  too  severe  for  them.  They  did  not  have  the  intelligence 
to  render  skilled  service  in  the  factories.  Under  these  cir- 
cumstances, it  was  very  easy  to  dispense  with  them,  and  to 
condemn  others  for  not  doing  so.  It  is  easy  to  do  right 
when  it  involves  no  sacrifice :  "Self  is  all  in  all." 

By  1820,  slavery  was  no  longer  "a  sleeping  dog,"  but 
very  wide-awake.  When  Missouri  applied  for  admission 
into  the  Union,  the  slavery  question  convulsed  the  nation. 
Finally,  a  compromise  was  adopted,  admitting  Missouri 
as  a  slave  state,  but  forbidding  slavery  north  of  36°  30' 
north  latitude.  This  quieted  matters  somewhat  till  1854; 
but  it  doomed  the  South  to  Egyptian  bondage. 


THE  HUNDRED  TEARS'  WRANGLE  173 

(4)     "THE  HIGHER  LAW" 

Meanwhile,  the  antislavery  sentiment  in  the  North  was 
growing.  First  gradual  emancipation  was  advocated ;  then 
(1832)  absolute  emancipation  of  every  slave  in  the  country. 
This  movement  met  with  bitter  opposition  even  in  the  North, 
but  Garrison  and  his  party  of  abolitionists  were  undaunted. 
In  1832,  was  founded  the  Antislavery  Society;  in  1833, 
the  American  Antislavery  Society;  later,  nearly  two 
thousand  abolition  societies.  Congress  was  flooded  with 
petitions.  This  movement  is  the  second  of  the  two  things 
that  postponed  the  day  of  peaceable  emancipation. 

In  connection  with  this  movement,  sprang  up  the  so- 
called  "Underground  Railroad."  By  means  of  spies  and 
emissaries  in  the  South,  especially  teachers  from  the  North, 
large  numbers  of  servants  were  taken  from  their  masters 
every  year,  Virginia  being  a  heavy  loser.  About  1840,  sev- 
eral states  passed  Personal  Liberty  bills  aiding  and  abetting 
runaway  slaves,  and  making  it  a  crime  to  aid  in  their  cap- 
ture— all  this  in  the  very  teeth  of  article  iv,  section  2,  of  the 
constitution,  and  of  the  Fugitive  Slave  laws  standing  on 
the  statute  books  of  the  United  States.  To  meet  the  charge 
of  unfairness  and  of  violation  of  compact,  the  phrase 
"higher  law"  was  devised,  and  soon  became  a  political 
catchword  in  some  sections.  When  the  South  pointed  to  the 
constitution,  the  abolitionists  said  that  there  was  a  law 
higher  than  the  constitution.  Between  1850  and  1860,  four- 
teen states  flagrantly  nullified  the  Fugitive  Slave  law  re- 
enacted  in  1850.  To  argue  with  such  men  was  a  waste  of 
breath.  There  stood  the  constitution  recognizing1  domestic 


174  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

slavery  and  providing  for  the  return  of  fugitive  slaves ;  but 
in  vain  did  the  South  plead  for  justice  and  protection. 

(5)   A  NEW  GOD  DEMANDED 

We  can  even  now  hear  the  yells  and  the  shrieks  of  the 
fanatics.  The  problems  that  had  baffled  Jefferson,  Marshall, 
and  other  giants  were  settled  with  perfect  ease  by  these 
pygmies;  and  the  means  proposed  by  them  was  the  same 
used  by  Alexander  when  he  untied  the  famous  knot  at 
Gordium — that  is,  the  sword. 

When  the  Supreme  Court  decided  that  slavery  was  rec- 
ognized by  the  constitution,  they  hooted  this  august  tribunal, 
and  cried,  "Down  with  the  Supreme  Court;  down  with  the 
constitution;  we  appeal  to  the  'higher  law.'  The  constitu- 
tion is  a  league  with  death  and  a  covenant  with  hell." 

When  Webster,  the  idol  of  New  England,  dared  to  say 
that  the  South  had  some  rights  in  the  matter,  many  de- 
nounced him,  saying  that  he  was  a  Judas  Iscariot  selling 
himself  for  Southern  votes  for  the  presidency ;  and  the  God- 
given  art  of  the  poet  was  used  to  hand  this  great  man  down 
to  eternal  infamy  wherever  American  literature  is  read  by 
countless  millions.  Some  blasphemous  fanatics  boldly  said, 
"The  times  demand,  and  we  must  have,  an  antislavery  con- 
s.itution,  an  antislavery  Bible,  and  an  antislavery  God." 

These  fanatics  abused  and  vilified  the  South,  using  the 
words  "slave-owner,"  "slave-holder,"  as  synonymous  with 
thief,  robber,  blackguard.  What  cared  they  that  Washing- 
ton himself  had  been  a  slave-holder,  and  that,  until  quite 


THE  HUNDRED  YEARS'  WRANGLE  175 

recently,  some  of  the  best  men  of  their  own  section  had  be- 
longed to  the  hated,  "slavocracy?"* 

Our  fathers,  however,  still  hoped  for  better  things;  they 
still  stood  on  the  rights  guaranteed  them  by  the  constitution. 

Soon,  too  soon,  these  fanatics  made  a  league  with  the 
politicians.  Some  of  the  latter  saw  that  the  slavery  issue 
might  be  used  in  some  quarters  as  a  "bloody  shirt"  to  con- 
jure with,  and  stir  up  their  lukewarm  voters.  In  1848,  a 
very  prominent  public  man  of  the  North  said  that  the 
slavery  question  was  an  "irrepressible  conflict,"  and  by  that 
fearful  utterance  not  only  inflamed  the  South,  but  encour- 
aged the  fanatics  to  make  war  upon  Southern  institutions. 

(6)   THE  PLOT  THICKENS 

The  Southern  people  still  hoped  for  fair  treatment,  and 
gave  up  a  part  of 'their  rights  in  the  interests  of  peace  and 
harmony.  Some  of  their  leading  statesmen,  Senator  Jeffer- 
son Davis  among  them,  followed  Henry  Clay  in  his  second 
compromise  bill  of  1850,  which  prohibited  slavery  in  the 
new  state  of  California,  settled  largely  by  Southern  people, 
but  left  to  other  territories  the  power  to  decide  the  question 
for  themselves.  This  compromise  act,  however,  was  vio- 
lated by  many,  and  Mr.  Lincoln  in  1858,  in  his  famous  de- 
bates with  Douglas,  said  that  "this  country  could  not  re- 
main half  free  and  half  slave."  If  a  man  of  his  ability  could 
thus  ignore  the  rights  of  the  South,  what  could  be  expected 
of  ordinary  people? 

*It  may  be  stated  on  high  authority  that  General  Grant  himself  owned  slaves  after 
General  Lee  had  sold  or  manumitted  all  under  his  control. 


176  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

Meantime,  Uncle  Tom's  Cabin  had  been  published 
( 1852).  Its  one-sided  presentation  of  slavery  infuriated  the 
South,  stirred  the  North  to  fever  heat,  and  cut  the  South  off 
still  more  from  the  sympathy  of  mankind.  Of  this  book, 
we  shall  speak  quite  frequently.  Just  here  we  pause  to  say 
that  its  author,  Mrs.  Harriet  Beecher  Stowe,  disclaimed  any 
intention  of  misrepresenting  the  South  or  of  denouncing  all 
slave-holders.  She  thought  that  slavery  ought  to  be  abol- 
ished, and  used  the  so-called  "purpose  novel"  to  aid  in  its 
abolishment.  Whatever  her  intentions,  her  method  was 
wrong,  and  unfair  to  Southern  civilization.  The  world  in- 
ferred that  the  noble  and  holy  Uncle  Tom  was  a  typical 
slave,  and  that  the  cruelty  practiced  upon  him  was  common 
in  the  South,  rather  than  a  monstrosity  which  would  have 
been  denounced  by  every  man,  woman,  and  child  south  of 
the  Potomac. 

Two  years  later  (1854),  another  spark  was  thrown  into 
the  magazine.  That  was  the  fearful  Kansas  question.  Con- 
gress decided  that  Kansas  should  enter  the  Union  unre- 
stricted, and  that  the  slavery  question  should  be  decided  later 
by  its  inhabitants.  This  has  been  characterized  by  a  dis- 
tinguished writer  as  "local  option"  applied  to  slavery;  and 
it  stirred  up  as  much  bitterness  in  the  country  at  large,  as 
"local  option"  always  does  in  small  communities.  Both 
sides  proceeded  to  induce  settlers  to  migrate  to  Kansas.  The 
abolitionists  were  very  successful  in  their  efforts,  and  filled 
the  new  state  with  a  population  that  voted  for  an  anti- 
slavery  constitution.  This  produced  bitterness  indescribable. 

In  1856,  another  scene  in  the  drama  was  enacted.     In 


HENRY  CLAY 


THE  HUNDRED  TEARS'  WRANGLE  177 

that  year  a  new  party,  avowed^-  hostile  to  Southern  insti- 
tutions, polled  a  vote  large  enough  to  make  the  South  fear 
that  her  rights  under  the  constitution  would  no  longer  be 
respected.  It  was  the  large  vote  cast  for  John  C.  Fremont, 
the  Republican  antislavery  candidate  for  president,  that  com- 
pelled the  South  to  believe  that  she  was  soon  to  be  deprived 
of  the  right  of  taking  slaves  into  the  territories,  the  common 
property  of  all  the  states — which  would  unquestionably  be  a 
clear  violation  of  the  terms  of  compact  or  partnership  made 
in  1787. 

In  the  next  year  (1857),  the  North  felt  that  she  had  a 
great  grievance.  In  that  year,  the  Supreme  Court  of  the 
United  States  decided  that  a  slave-owner  might  take  his 
slaves  into  the  territories  just  as  he  took  any  other  property. 
For  this  decision,  the  court  was  abused  by  fanatics  and 
loaded  with  execration.  Especially  hated  was  Chief  Jus- 
tice Roger  B.  Taney,  the  distinguished  son  of  Maryland. 
This  decision,  which  was  delivered  in  the  famous  Dred  Scott 
case,  added  fuel  to  the  flame.  In  discussing  this  matter, 
even  Mr.  John  Fiske  prejudices  the  young  student  against 
the  South  and  against  the  majority  of  the  justices. 

In  this  contention,  the  South  was  still  clinging  to  the 
constitution.  Though  her  claims  were  usually  legal,  the 
South  was  in  regard  to  slavery  lagging  in  the  rearguard. 
All  the  world  seemed  against  her.  The  whole  North  be- 
lieved that  slavery  was  as  baJ  as  Mormonism.  The  labor- 
ing men  of  Europe  were  against  her.  The  higher  classes  of 
Europe,  not  realizing  the  difficulties  of  the  problem,  and  not 
knowing  how  the  proud,  high-strung  temper  of  the  South 
12 


178  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

had  been  tried  by  years  of  abuse  and  misrepresentation, 
withheld  any  open  sympathy.  She  was  now,  instead  of 
Greece,  "the  Niobe  of  nations." 

In  the  year  1858,  as  said  already,  Abraham  Lincoln,  then 
rising  into  prominence  in  Illinois,  declared  that  "this  country 
could  not  remain  half  free  and  half  slave." 

In*  1859,  John  Brown's  raid  stirred  the  South  beyond  ex- 
pression. This  fanatic,  supported  by  a  band  of  desperadoes 
armed  with  pikes  and  other  weapons,  crossed  the  Potomac 
at  Harper's  Ferry,  Virginia,  seized  the  arsenal,  entrenched 
himself  there,  and  shot  down  several  inoffensive  citizens, 
among  them  the  mayor  of  Harper's  Ferry.  His  object  was 
to  stir  up  an  insurrection  among  the  slaves,  but  he  met  with 
slight  encouragement  among  the  negroes.  Captured  by  the 
United  States  and  Virginia  forces,  Governor  Wise,  Colonel 
R.  E.  Lee,  Thos.  J.  Jackson,  and  J.  E.  B.  Stuart  being 
prominent,  he  was  turned  over  to  the  courts,  tried  by  a  fair 
jury,  and  hanged  under  the  laws  of  Virginia.  What  fol- 
lowed? Denunciation  of  Brown  throughout  the  country? 
On  the  contrary,  he  was  in  many  quarters  glorified  and 
lauded  as  a  martyr ;  bells  were  tolled  in  his  honor ;  and  pul- 
pit, press,  and  platform  denounced  Governor  Wise  as  a 
Judas  Iscariot,  and  added  Brown's  name  to  the  calendar  of 
saints,  some  even  comparing  him  to  Christ  himself. 

The  last  statement  is  sometimes  denied  by  Northern 
writers;  but  none  can  deny  that  the  name  of  John  Brown 
was  used  as  a  charm  to  conjure  with,  and  that  great  armies 
sang  him  into  glory  as  they  marched  across  the  Potomac 
into  Virginia. 


THE  HUNDRED  YEARS'  WRANGLE  179 

(7)    THE  LAST  STRAW 

This  "glorification"  of  John  Brown  reduced  the  South  to 
desperation.  She  did  not  know  what  to  expect  next.  Ac- 
cordingly, many  of  her  principal  statesmen  and  numbers  of 
her  other  citizens  began  to  believe  that  she  would  never  be 
happy  again  in  the  Union.  Few,  however,  were  as  yet  in 
favor  of  secession. 

The  patience  of  the  South  was  not  yet  exhausted.  She 
still  hoped  against  hope.  She  did  not  wish  to  leave  the 
Union.  It  was  her  Union,  and  why  should  she  be  driven 
out  of  it  as  long  as  life  was  worth  living  under  its  starry 
banner  ? 

There  is  a  limit  to  human  endurance,  and  a  time  comes 
when  patience  ceases  to  be  a  virtue.  The  next  year,  1860, 
this  time  came  to  many  noble  Southerners.  The  election  of 
a  sectional  president  on  a  sectional  platform,  that  is,  the 
election  of  Abraham  Lincoln,  who  had  said  in  1858  that 
"this  country  could  not  remain  half  free  and  half  slave,"  and 
that  by  a  strictly  sectional  vote  hurled  against  the  South 
and  her  institutions — this  was  regarded  by  seven  states  as 
an  overt  attack  upon  the  South ;  and,  rather  than  wait  to  see 
what  the  new  president  would  do  to  carry  out  the  policy  of 
his  party,  they  fell  back  upon  the  right,  always  reserved  and 
never  surrendered,  of  withdrawing  from  the  Union  which 
now  threatened  to  use  against  the  states  the  powers  lent  it 
by  the  states;  in  other  words  they  determined  to  exercise 
the  right  of  secession. 

Slavery,  we  see,  was  the  greatest  cause  of  alienation  be- 
tween the  sections.  Many  books  and  thousands  of  honest 


180  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

but  mistaken  men  persist  in  saying  that  the  war  was  fought 
on  the  slavery  issue ;  this  is  entirely  erroneous.  The  South- 
ern soldier  was  not  fighting  for  slavery,  and  the  Northern 
soldier  was  not  fighting  to  abolish  it.  The  Southern  soldier 
was  fighting  for  his  state,  at  her  summons,  heeding  the  call 
of  her  to  whom  he  believed  he  owed  his  first  allegiance ;  and, 
if  there  was  any  mistake,  any  crime,  he  was  not  responsible; 
"his  but  to  do  and  die." 

The  Northern  soldier  was  not  intentionally  fighting  to 
abolish  slavery.  The  politicians  had  tricked  him  into  think- 
ing that  he  was  fighting  for  the  Union,  now  assailed  by 
"rebels"  and  "traitors;"  that  he  was  defending  the  flag, 
lately  insulted  by  "hot-headed  South  Carolina"  and  her 
minions. 

The  Southern  soldiers  owned  very  few  slaves,  though 
most  of  them  were  more  or  less  directly  interested  in  slave 
property.  The  Northern  soldiers  cared  little  for  the  negro, 
and  few  would  have  made  war  in  his  behalf.  Slavery,  then, 
was  but  an  important  incident  of  the  war;  the  real  causes 
lie  much  deeper. 

The  same  politicians  that  deceived  the  soldiers  influenced 
Mr.  Lincoln.  He,  too,  started  out  with  a  high  sense  of  duty 
towards  the  Union,  saying  that  he  had  sworn  to  see  that  the 
laws  of  the  United  States  were  executed  in  all  the  states, 
and  that  he  had  neither  the  wish  nor  the  authority  to  inter- 
fere with  slavery.  Erelong,  however,  he  made  a  complete 
somersault.  After  the  brilliant  victories  of  Lee  and  Jack- 
son in  1862  had  depressed  the  North  beyond  expression, 
he  issued  his  famous  Emancipation  Proclamation 


THE  HUNDRED  YEARS'  WRANGLE  181 

(Jan.  i,  1863),  which  was  a  mere  war  measure,  and  would 
have  been  declared  utterly  unconstitutional  by  any  Supreme 
Court  referred  to  in  this  chapter.  The  United  States  still 
owes  the  South  two  billion  dollars  for  her  negroes. 

IV 

The  Right  of  Secession 

(i)  NEW  ENGLAND  PIONEERS  OF  SECESSION 

In  our  day,  no  one  ever  mentions  the  possibility  of  se- 
cession. No  matter  what  unjust  laws  Congress  enacts, 
no  man,  no  newspaper,  seriously  threatens  secession. 
The  last  suggestion  of  such  a  possibility  came,  we  believe, 
from  some  Western  people  during  the  presidential  campaign 
of  1896,  when  William  J.  Bryan  almost  swept  the  country. 

Not  so  with  the  generations  immediately  before  us.  With 
them,  secession  was  always  a  possibility,  and  oftentimes  a 
probability.  As  the  ill-feeling  between  the  sections  in- 
creased, the  probability  of  secession  became  greater  and 
greater.  The  South  being  in  the  minority  in  Congress  and 
being  the  injured  party,  secession  became  more  distinctly  a 
Southern  doctrine;  but  we  shall  show  clearly  that  the  right 
of  secession  was  held  by  eminent  men,  and  by  whole  com- 
munities, in  other  sections  of  the  country. 

Secession  was  first  threatened'  in  New  England.  While 
the  thirteen  states  were  living  under  the  old  Articles  of  Con- 
federation (1781-1788),  threats  of  a  New  England  confed- 


182  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

eration  were  loud  and  deep,  and  prominent  men  declared 
that,  if  the  Mississippi  river  were  not  closed  up  for  twenty- 
five  years,  the  New  England  states  would  secede  from  the 
"perpetual  Union"  and  establish  a  confederation  for  them- 
selves. In  1792  and  1794,  secession  movements  began  to 
take  definite  shape.  In  1793,  Timothy  Dwight,  the  eminent 
theologian  and  the  president  of  Yale,  speaking  of  the  threat- 
ened war  with  European  powers,  said :  "A  war  with  Great 
Britain,  we,  at  least  in  New  England,  will  not  enter  into. 
Sooner  would  99  out  of  100  of  our  inhabitants  separate  from 
the  Union  than  plunge  themselves  into  an  abyss  of  misery." 
In  1796,  Governor  Wolcott,  of  Connecticut,  declared  that, 
if  Jefferson  should  be  elected  president,  he  (Wolcott)  would 
heartily  favor  a  separation  from  the  Southern  states.  Gov- 
ernor William  Plumer  (Plummer),  of  New  Hampshire,  one 
of  the  most  famous  publicists  and  writers  of  the  early  part 
of  the  1 8th  century,  names  many  prominent  New  Englanders 
that  were  in  favor  of  a  dissolution  of  the  Union — the  second 
"perpetual  Union"  (1789).  Among  them  were  Timothy 
Pickering,  George  Cabot,  Harrison  Gray  Otis,  Josiah 
Quincy,  Roger  Griswold,  the  Lowells,  Stephen  Longfellow, 
and  many  other  fathers  of  New  England.  In  1804,  Colonel 
Timothy  Pickering  said :  "The  principles  of  our  Revolu- 
tion point  to  the  remedy :  a  separation A 

Northern  confederacy  would  unite  congenial  characters,  and 

preserve  fairer  prospect  of  public  happiness 

It  (the  separation)  must  begin  in  Massachusetts."  Some 
may  say  that  these  are  the  views  of  individuals.  In  1804, 
the  legislature  of  Massachusetts  resolved:  "That  the  an- 


THE  HUNDRED  YEARS'  WRANGLE  183 

nexation  of  Louisiana  to  the  Union  transcends  the  constitu- 
tional power  of  the  government  of  the  United  States.  It 
formed  a  new  confederacy,  to  which  the  States  united  by  the 
former  compact  are  not  bound  to  adhere."  Where  was  the 
right  of  secession  ever  more  clearly  stated?  The  reader 
will  notice,  also,  that  the  legislature  of  Massachusetts 
in  1804  regarded  the  Union  of  1788  ag  a  compact,  and  as 
dissoluble  for  cause  satisfactory  to  one  of  the  parties  thereto. 

The  high  priest  of  secession  was  the  eminent  Josiah 
Quincy,  of  Massachusetts.  In  the  Congress  of  1811,  while 
the  bill  for  admitting  the  Louisiana  territory  to  statehood 
was  under  discussion,  this  distinguished  statesman — after- 
wards president  of  Harvard, — said :  "If  this  bill  passes,  it 
is  my  deliberate  judgment  that  it  is  virtually  a  dissolution  of 
this  Union ;  that  it  will  free  the  states  from  their  moral  ob- 
ligations ;  and,  as  it  will  be  the  right  of  all,  so  it  will  be  the 
duty  of  -some,  definitely  to  prepare  for  a  separation — • 
amicably  if  they  can,  violently  if  they  must."  Quincy  was 
called  to  order  by  Mr.  Poindexter,  of  Mississippi  territory ; 
but  the  House,  on  appeal,  decided  that  a  suggestion  of  se- 
cession was  not  out  of  order.  Then  Mr.  Quincy  proceeded 
to  argue  that  the  Union  was  a  partnership  consisting  of 
thirteen  members,  and  that,  if  ten  of  them  admitted  a  four- 
teenth not  acceptable  to  the  other  three,  the  three  could  de- 
mand a  dissolution. 

Hildreth,  the  Massachusetts  historian,  says  that  this  was 
the  first  mention  of  secession  ever  heard  in  Congress. 

Eighteen  years  later,  Quincy  was  elected  president  of 
Harvard  College.  There  he  served  with  great  usefulness 


184  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

and  great  distinction  for  sixteen  years ;  and  we  may  imagine 
that  he  taught  his  views  as  to  the  right  of  secession  to 
thousands  of  the  brightest  young  men  of  New  England. 
The  same  may  be  conjectured  as  to  Dr.  Timothy  Dwight, 
the  learned  and  eminent  president  of  Yale,  quoted  in  an 
earlier  paragraph.  We  shall  not  be  surprised  then  if  se- 
cession views  were  commonly  held  in  New  England  from 
about  1810  to  about  1850. 

John  Quincy  Adams  says  that  a  secession  scheme  was 
formed  in  1803-1804,  and  that  a  military  man  was  selected 
to  lead  the  armies  that  might  be  needed.  In  1839,  this  same 
statesman  and  ex-president  said  that  separation  was  better 
than  an  unhappy  and  unwilling  union.  In  1842,  he  pre- 
sented in  Congress  a  petition  from  citizens  of  Haverhill, 
Massachusetts,  for  a  dissolution  of  the  Union. 

Horatio  Seymour,  the  eminent  New  Yorker,  said  in  a 
public  address,  October  8,  1880:  "In  1812,  while.the  walls 
of  the  Capitol  were  blackened  and  marred  by  the  fires  kindled 
by  our  foes,  and  our  Union  was  threatened  with  disasters, 
the  leading  officials  and  citizens  of  New  England  threatened 
resistance  to  the  military  measures  of  the  administration !" 
How  Massachusetts  and  Connecticut  refused  to  send  their 
quota  of  troops,  we  have  seen  already. 

John  Fiske  says:  "John  Quincy  Adams,  a  supporter  of 
the  Embargo,  privately  informed  President  Jefferson -that 
further  attempts  to  enforce  it  in  the  New  England  states 
would  be  likely  to  drive  them  to  secession."  This  was  in 
1809. 

The  "storm  center"  of  New  England  secession  was  the 
famous  Hartford  Convention.  Let  us  quote  Mr.  Fiske 


THE  HUNDRED  T EARS'  WRANGLE  185 

again:  "In  December,  1814,  some  of  the  Federalist  leaders 
met  at  Hartford  and  passed  resolutions.  Among  other 
things,  they  demanded  that  custom  house  duties  collected  in 
New  England  should  be  paid  to  the  states  within  whose 
borders  they  were  collected,  and  not  to  the  United  States. 
This  would  have  virtually  dissolved  the  Union."  Mr.  Fiske 
puts  it  very  mildly. 

Mr.  Fiske  says,  "Some  of  the!  Federalist  leaders."  Ho- 
ratio Seymour  says,  "A  convention  of  delegates  appointed  by 
the  legislatures  of  three  of  the  New  England  states,  and  by 
delegates  from  counties  in  Vermont  and  New  Hampshire." 
John  Quincy  Adams  believed  firmly  that  the  convention  was 
called  to  dissolve  the  Union,  and  that  it  would  have  met 
again  and  done  so,  but  for  the  closing  of  the  war  with 
England  (1815). 

(2)  LATE  NEW  ENGLAND  SECESSIONISTS 

In  1844  and  1845,  the  state  of  Massachusetts  again  threat- 
ened secession.  When  the  annexation  of  Texas  was  pend- 
ing, the  legislature  of  Massachusetts  resolved  that  "the  an- 
nexation of  Texas  might  drive  these  states  into  a  dissolution 
of  the  Union."  Notice  the  language,  "these  states."  This 
implies  clearly  that  Massachusetts  knew  of  other  Northern 
states  that  believed  in  the  right  of  secession.  We  are  not 
attacking  Massachusetts  and  her  sisters.  If  they  believed 
that  their  interests  were  endangered  by  the  annexation  of 
Texas,  they  had  a  right  to  leave  the  Union.  We  simply 
wish  to  prove  that  belief  in  secession  was  not  confined  to  any 
one  section  of  the  country. 


186  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

We  have  shown  that  New  England  leaders  believed  in 
secession.  We  have  proved  that  a  convention  representing 
three  New  England  states  and  parts  of  others  took  strong 
secession  ground  in  1814.  We  have  shown  that  the  most 
influential  state  of  New  England  threatened  to  secede  in 
1844  and  1845.  How,  then,  can  any  one  say  that  the  North 
did  not  believe  in  secession  after  1830?  Even  if  this  could 
be  proved,  why  should  the  South  be  condemned  for  believing 
in  it  in  1861  ?  Let  us,  however,  trace  Northern  opinion  to 
a  later  period.  In  1860,  Horace  Greeley,  the  famous  editor 
of  the  New  York  Tribune,  said :  "If  the  cotton  states  shall 
become  satisfied  that  they  can  do  better  out  of  the  Union 
than  in  it,  we  insist  on  letting  them  go  in  peace.  The  right 
to  secede  may  be  a  revolutionary  one,  but  it  exists  neverthe- 
less  We  hope  never  to  live  in  a  republic 

whereof  one  section  is  pinned  to  the  residue  by  bayonets. 

If  the  Declaration  of  Independence 

justifies  the  secession  from  the  British  Empire  of  3,000,000 
colonists  in  1776,  we  do  not  see  why  it  would  not  justify  the 
secession  of  5,000,000  Southrons  in  1861." 

The  New  York  Herald,  in  1860,  admitted  the  right  of 

secession,  and  said,  "Coercion is  out  of 

the  question."  The  Cincinnati  Commercial,  one  of  the  great 
ante-bellum  Republican  papers,  favored  the  recognition  of  a 
slave-holding  republic.  General  Winfield  Scott,  the  com- 
mander-in-chief  of  the  United  States  army  in  1861,  was  in 
favor  of  letting  "the  wayward  sisters  depart  in  peace." 

From  all  we  have  said,  there  is  but  one  fair  inference: 
the  South  had  the  right  to  secede  if  she  wished  to  do  so. 


THE  HUNDRED  YEARS'  WRANGLE  187 

Why  she  wished  to  do  so  has  been  already  told,  and  need 
not  be  repeated. 

For  many  years  after  the  war,  Northern  writers  rarely 
admitted  the  right  of  secession  as  ever  having  existed.  Mr. 
Charles  Francis  Adams  says  that  up  to  about  1830  this 
right  was  universally  admitted ;  but  we  have  shown  that  his 
own  grandfather  and  his  own  state  believed  in  this  right 
after  that  time,  and  that  his  state  threatened  to  exercise  it. 
More  recently,  candid  students  of  history  have  been  more 
outspoken.  In  1889,  Mr.  Henry  Cabot  Lodge,  sprung  from 
the  best  secession  blood  of  New  England  and  now  (1906) 
senator  from  Massachosetts,  said  that  originally  "each  and 
every  state  had  the  right  peaceably  to  withdraw."  When 
was  this  right  surrendered  prior  to  1861  ? 

In  the  face  of  such  facts  as  those  given,  writers  of  high 
repute  in  the  North  are  still  telling  us  in  their  books  that  the 
South  had  no  warrant  for  the  doctrine  of  secession.  A  well- 
known  Northern  text-book  says :  "For  fifty  years,  no  man, 
or  set  of  men,  possessed  of  political  influence  had  so  much  as 
hinted  at  the  possibility  of  Northern  secession." 

This  Northern  scholar  is  quite  sarcastic  towards  John 
Quincy  Adams  and  his  constituents  of  1842,  referred  to  in 
a  foregoing  paragraph,  the  Massachusetts  legislature  of 
1844  and  1845,  and  various  congressmen  and  senators  who 
presented  petitions  in  Congress  between  1820  and  1860.  Of 
ignorance,  we  dare  not  accuse  him;  fof  many  of  his  state- 
ments as  to  the  treatment  of  slaves  in  the  North  have  been 
quoted  in  this  volume. 

Some  of  the  so-called  histories  are  filled  with  bold  state- 


188  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

ments  of  opinion,  palmed  off  as  history  on  unwary  readers. 
One  of  them  bearing  an  eminent  name  on  its  title  page  says : 
"The  doctrine  of  state  sovereignty  thus  put  every  man  in 
the  South  on  the  wrong  side,  and  kept  him  there."  From 
these  two  books  and  others  like  them,  the  student  would 
never  suspect  that  the  idea  of  secession  had  ever  had  any 
serious  foothold  in  New  England;  for  neither  of  them 
speaks  candidly  of  the  Hartford  Convention  and  its  plans 
for  secession;  and  one  of  them  varnishes  it  over  so  that  a 
casual  reader  would  hardly  know  of  its  importance. 

Some  writers,  however,  are  more  candid  in  their  state- 
ments. Prof.  Goldwin  Smith,  of  Canada,  though  far  from 
friendly  to  the  South,  recently  said :  "Few  who  have  looked 
into  the  history  can  doubt  that  the  Union  originally  was  a 
compact  dissoluble  on  breach  of  the  articles  of  union." 
Professor  Smith  does  not  tell  us  when  the  South  ever  sur- 
rendered the  right  of  dissolving  the  Union  in  case  of  a 
breach  of  the  articles  of  union.  We  say  that  this  right  was 
not  surrendered  until  the  fearful  war  of  the  '6o's,  and  only 
then  at  the  point  of  the  bayonet. 

Very  recently,  Mr.  Charles  Francis  Adams,  the  Massa- 
chusetts free-lance  and  the  "morning  star  of  reconciliation," 
said,  "Both  sides  were  right  in  1861."  This  is  magnani- 
mous, but  the  Confederate  veterans  cannot  endorse  it.  If 
the  South  was  right,  the  North  was  wrong,  and  vice  versa. 

To  the  same  fearless  son  of  a  race  that  fearlessly  speaks 
out,  we  are  indebted  for  the  valuable  fact  that,  from  about 
1825  to  1840,  the  right  of  secession  was  taught  at  the  West 
Point  Military  Academy.  The  author  of  the  text-book 


THE  HUNDRED  YEARS'  WRANGLE  189 

used  chere  was  William  Rawle,  one  of  the  most  distinguished 
legal  writers  of  Pennsylvania.  Mr.  Rawle  was  appointed  to 
high  positions  by  President  Washington,  and  declined  a 
seat  in  the  cabinet  of  that  great  president.  His  lectures  on 
constitutional  law  attracted  large  numbers  of  law  students 
to  Philadelphia,  where  his  influence  was  incalculable.  In 
the  book  referred  to,  A  View  of  the  Constitution  of  the 
United  States,  Rawle  says  plainly,  "The  secession  of  a  state 
from  the  Union  depends  on  the  will  of  the  people  of  such 
state."  No  Southern  writer  ever  stated  it  more  clearly. 

While  this  doctrine  was  being  taught  at  West  Point,  Jef- 
ferson Davis,  Albert  Sidney  Johnston,  Joseph  E.  Johnston, 
Leonidas  Polk,  Robert  E.  Lee,  and  other  Southern  cadets 
afterwards  distinguished  were  graduated  from  the  academy. 
The  right  of  secession  they  learned,  then,  from  the  Federal 
government.  How  that  government  punished  them  for 
their  proficiency  as  students,  \ve  shall  learn  in  later  chapters. 

(3)  NULLIFICATION  IN  THE  NORTH 

If  facts  mean  anything,  we  have  proved  that  secession  was 
first  threatened  in  New  England.  We  now  pass  on  to  show 
that  nullification  was  not  only  believed  in  but  actually  prac- 
tised in  New  England  long  before  South  Carolina  ever  made 
her  reputation  as  a  nullifier. 

In  1809,  when  the  Embargo  Act  of  1807,  passed  by 
Congress  to  protect  the  United  States  against  England,  in- 
jured the  commerce  of  New  England  more  than  that  of 
England,  Massachusetts  declared  that  "the  act  was  not  bind- 
ing upon  her  citizens."  This  was  nullification.  In  1812, 


190  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

while  the  country  was  at  war  with  England,  "the  leading 
officials  and  citizens  of  New  England  threatened  resistance 
to  the  military  measures  of  the  administration."  This  is 
quoted  from  a  speech  by  Horatio  Seymour,  of  New  York. 

Mr.  Fiske,  you  will  recall,  said  that  the  Hartford  Con- 
vention, composed  of  the  flower  of  the  New  Englanders, 
"passed  resolutions."  That  is  putting  it  mildly.  One  of 
these  resolutions  was  :  "When  emergencies  occur  which  are 
either  beyond  the  reach  of  judicial  tribunals  or  too  pressing 
to  admit  of  delay  incident  to  their  forms,  states  which  have 
no  common  umpire  must  be  their  own  judges  and  execute 
their  own  decisions."  This  is  nullification.  This  state- 
ment of  the  fathers  of  New  England  is  as  clear  and  as  strong 
as  anything  ever  said  by  John  C.  Calhoun  or  the  state  of 
South  Carolina.  In  1832,  South  Carolina  said  that,  if  the 
pending  tariff  law  passed,  she  would  be  her  own  judge  and 
execute  her  own  decision — which  was  that  that  law  would 
not  be  binding  upon  her  people. 

That  the  Embargo  Act  of  1807  kd  New  England  to 
threatened  secession  and  to  actual  nullification,  we  have  al- 
ready seen.  The  War  of  1812  produced  the  same  results* 
Of  the  refusal  of  the  two  largest  New  England  states  to 
furnish  their  quota  of  troops  for  national  defense,  we  spoke 
in  the  chapter  on  the  War  of  1812.  That  was  nullification. 
Again,  in  1844-1845,  the  legislatures  of  several  New  Eng- 
land states  resolved  that  those  states  were  not  bound  to  rec- 
ognize the  annexation  of  Texas.  What  is  this  but  nullifi- 
cation ?  It  makes  South  Carolina  turn  green  with  envy. 

The  right  of  a  state  to  nullify  an  act  of  Congress  was 


THE  HUNDRED  YEARS'  WRANGLE  191 

always  held  by  a  respectable  minority  in  the  South.  Belief 
in  secession  was,  on  the  other  hand,  almost  universal.  To 
stay  in  the  Union,  however,  and  attempt  to  nullify  a  law  of 
Congress,  the  great  mass  of  the  Southern  people  did  not  con- 
sider logical.  The  Virginia  and  Kentucky  Resolutions  of 
.  i798-'99,  passed  at  the  time  of  the  Alien  and  Sedition  Acts, 
by  the  legislatures  of  Virginia  and  Kentucky,  show  that  the 
doctrine  of  nullification  was  popular  at  that  time  in  those 
two  states,  but  this  doctrine  was  never  generally  popular. 
No  Southern  state  ever  nullified;  South  Carolina  in  1832 
only  threatened ;  while  Massachusetts,  as  we  have  seen,  sev- 
eral times  acted. 

The  decade  1850  to  1860  was  the  great  era  of  Northern 
nullification.  In  that  period,  as  already  shown,  fourteen 
Northern  and  Western  states  nullified  both  the  constitution 
and  a  law  based  upon  it.  That  is  to  say,  after  the  passage 
of  the  Omnibus  bill  of  1850,  one  clause  of  which  was  a 
stringent  act  for  the  return  of  fugitive  slaves,  these  fourteen 
states  passed  Personal  Liberty  bills  in  the  very  face  of  the 
new  Fugitive  Slave  law  of  1850.  In  every  possible  way, 
slaves  were  helped  in  escaping  from  their  masters.  The 
constitution  and  the  Fugitive  Slave  law  were  nullified  openly 
and  boldly.  As  said  already,  this  was  one  of  the  South's 
sorrows  in  the  period  just  before  the  war  between  the  sec- 
tions. 

The  greatest  Southern  exponent  of  nullification  was  John 
C.  Calhoun.  His  influence  was  very  great,  but  not  great 
enough  to  make  this  doctrine  popular.  In  1832,  Virginia 
did  not  believe  in  it.  She  sent  a  commissioner  to  urge  South 


192  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

Carolina  to  withdraw  her  threat  of  nullifying  the  tariff  acts 
of  Congress. 

It  was  reserved  for  the  oldest  of  the  Northern  states  to 
take  up  this  doctrine  in  1844,  twelve  years  after  South  Caro- 
lina had  dropped  it,  and  for  thirteen  others  to  "out-Herod 
Herod"  after  1850. 

Are  these  facts  stated  in  the  histories  ?  Would  a  South- 
ern youth  ever  dream  that  South  Carolina  was  far  behind 
many  Northern  states  in  the  matter  of  nullification  ? 

We  turn  to  the  indexes  of  several  standard  Northern 
text-books.  Under  the  word  "nullification,"  we  are  almost 
invariably  referred  to  the  South  Carolina  matter  of  1832; 
very  faint  intimation  do  we  find  that  the  North  taught 
South  Carolina  how  to  nullify.  Fiske  is  one  of  the  few 
frank  and  candid  Northern  writers,  and  he  puts  it  very 
mildly.  The  Encyclopedia  Britannica,  in  its  discussion  on 
the  subject,  leaves  us  under  the  impression  that  the  whole 
thing  was  born  in  the  "fevered  brain"  of  South  Carolina, 
and  that  she  had  no  warrant  for  her  action  of  1832. 

V 

*  The  War  » 

To  the  last  and  extreme  resort — secession — then,  the 
Couth  was  finally  driven.  The  "straw  that  broke  the 
camel's  back"  was  the  election  of  Abraham  Lincoln,  an 
avowed  enemy  of  slavery,  but  objectionable  to  the  South 
rather  because  he  was  the  candidate  of  a  party  born  out  of 
the  hostility  to  her  and  her  institutions.  As  soon  as  he  was 


JOHN  C.  CALHOUN 


THE  HUNDRED  YEARS'  WRANGLE  193 

elected,  the  secession  movement  began.  South  Carolina  se- 
ceded December  20,  1860;  Mississippi,  January  9,  1861 ; 
Florida,  January  10;  Alabama,  January  n;  Georgia,  Jan- 
uary 19 ;  Louisiana,  January  26.  On  the  8th  of  February,  a 
convention  of  delegates  from  these  states  met  at  Mont- 
gomery, Alabama,  and  formed  a  temporary  government  for 
the  Confederate  States  of  America,  and  elected  Jefferson 
Davis,  of  Mississippi,  president,  and  Alexander  H.  Stephens, 
of  Georgia,  vice-president.  February  I,  Texas  seceded 
and  applied  for  admission  to  the  new  republic. 

Other  Southern  states  held  back,  hoping  that  some  com- 
promise might  be  made.  Virginia  called  a  Peace  Conven- 
tion, but  this  effected  nothing.  President  James  Buchanan, 
a  Pennsylvania  Democrat,  did  not  believe  that  his  oath  of 
office  required  him  to  coerce  the  seceding  states,  and  left  the 
question  to  be  settled  by  the  incoming  president.  The 
latter,  Abraham  Lincoln,  an  Illinois  Republican,  believed 
that  his  oath  of  office  compelled  him  to  call  out  armies  to 
see  that  the  laws  of  the  United  States  were  duly  obeyed  in 
all  sections  of  the  country.  His  call  for  troops  was  indig- 
nantly met  by  Arkansas,  Tennessee,  Virginia,  and  North 
Carolina.  Seeing  armies  mustering  to  march  against  their 
Southern  sisters,  these  states  seceded  from  the  Union — Vir- 
ginia, April  17 ;  Arkansas,  May  6;  North  Carolina,  May  20; 
Tennessee,  June  8.  Kentucky,  Missouri,  and  Maryand  were 
divided  in  their  sympathies,  but  all  furnished  some  great 
generals  and  some  fine  troops  to  the  Confederacy. 

The  Southern  leaders  seem  to  have  expected  a  peaceable 
secession.  For  this  reason,  few  preparations  had  been  made 
13 


194  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

for  an  armed  conflict.  Only  a  few  very  far-sighted  men, 
like  Jefferson  Davis  and  Robert  E.  Lee,  foresaw  that  the 
Northern  states  would  not  permit  any  state  or  states  to  se- 
cede peaceably.  Senator  Davis  got  little  thanks  when  he 
told  his  constituents  and  others  that  a  long  war  would  fol- 
low secession.  When  many  talked  about  a  three-months' 
war,  Col.  Robert  E.  Lee  predicted  that  the  struggle  would 
last  seven  years,  and  be  immense  in  its  proportions. 

For  this  war  between  the  North  and  the  South,  several 
names  are  more  or  less  common.  The  Northern  people 
used  to  call  it  the  "Rebellion ;"  and  this  title  defaces  the  pub- 
lished records  of  the  government,  grating  day  after  day 
upon  the  feelings  of  the  Southern  reader,  because  it  is  as- 
sociated with  conquest,  contumely,  and  perversion  of  history. 
The  war  was  not  a  rebellion.  If  the  states  created  the 
Union,  how  could  the  creators  rebel  against  the  thing 
created?  If  the  Union  was  the  general  agent  of  the  states, 
how  could  the  principals  rebel  against  their  agent?  If  the 
Union  was  a  partnership,  and  if  some  of  the  partners  wished 
to  withdraw,  how  is  that  a  rebellion,  even  if  the  other  part-1 
ners  forcibly  drag  them  back  into  partnership  ? 

Many  writers  of  both  sections  now  use  the  term  "Civil 
War;"  but  this,  while  not  offensive,  is  logically  and  historic- 
ally inaccurate,  and  has  been  repudiated  by  the  Confederate 
veterans ;  for  a  civil  war  is  a  struggle  for  supremacy  between 
two  or  more  opposing  parties  or  factions  in  the  same  nation, 
while  the  war  of  1861-1865  was  a  war  fought  by  a  large 
section  of  the  people  of  our  country  for  total  separation  and 
independence.  It  was  really  a  war  between  two  nations, 
and  General  Lee  so  regarded  it. 


THE  HUNDRED  TEARS9  WRANGLE  195 

Some  call  it  the  War  of  Secession,  or  the  War  for  Seces- 
sion. These  are  better  than  the  two  names  discussed  above, 
but  are  not  satisfactory. 

Many  old  Confederates  like  the  name  War  for  Southern 
Independence;  but  this  is  too  long  to  gain  any  general  ac- 
ceptance. A  good  many  Southern  books  call  it  the  Confed- 
erate War ;  but  this  would  imply  that  it  was  instigated  and 
brought  on  by  the  South — which  is  totally  erroneous.  For 
many  years,  the  Southern  people  called  it  "the  war,"  but, 
after  the  war  with  Spain  (1898),  another  name  was  felt  to 
be  necessary. 

Around  the  "camp  fires"  of  the  veterans  or  over  their 
pipes,  some  good  old  fathers  and  grandfathers  call  it  "our 
war;"  but  this,  while  sociable  and  endearing,  will  never 
spread  among  the  masses. 

The  name  "Great  War"  has  recently  been  proposed,  and 
is  used  frequently  in  the  Confederate  Veteran,  the  organ  of 
the  various  associations  for  preserving  the  records,  mem- 
ories, and  traditions  of  the  struggle.  That  title,  however, 
would  not  do  in  general  history,  for  we  might  have  at  any 
time  a  great  war  with  some  strong  nation.  The  name 
War  between  the  States  has  the  high  authority  of  Jefferson 
Davis  and  of  Alexander  H.  Stephens,  two  of  the  most  prom- 
inent Southern  statesmen,  and  has  been  officially  adopted 
by  the  Grand  Camp  of  Confederate  Veterans.  It  is,  how- 
ever, rather  longer  than  busy  people  are  apt  to  fancy,  but  is 
logically  correct,  and  can  be  used  without  wounding  the  feel- 
ings of  any  reader.  At  this  time,  we  prefer  it  to  any  other 
name,  and  shall  use  it  frequently  in  the  following  pages. 


196  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

Mr.  Lincoln  should  never  have  used  the  term  "Rebel- 
lion." Of  all  men  in  the  North  he  should  have  called  the 
war  "The  Revolution  of  1861" ;  for  he  declared  in  Congress, 
January  12,  1848,  in  a  debate  about  Texas  that  any  portion 
of  a  people  may  "revolutionize",  and  take  possession  of  the 
territory  they  inhabit.  His  exact  words  are:  "Any  people 
anywhere,  being  inclined  and  having  the  power,  have  the 
right  to  rise  up  and  shake  off  the  existing  government,  and 
form  a  new  one  that  suits  it  better.  This  is  a  most  valuable 
and  most  sacred  right,  a  right  which,  we  hope  and  believe,  is 
to  liberate  the  world.  Nor  is  the  right  confined  to  cases  in 
which  the  whole  people  of  an  existing  government  may 
choose  to  exercise  it.  Any  portion  of  such  people,  that  can, 
may  revolutionize  and  make  their  own  of  so  much  of  the 
territory  as  they  inhabit."* 

Whatever  its  correct  name,  the  storm  long  brewing  burst 
in  1 86 1.  For  four  years,  the  South  waged  a  heroic  contest 
against  enormous  odds,  and  had  to  surrender  April  9,  1865. 

Slavery  was  extinguished.  Secession,  as  an  actual  fact, 
was  given  up.  A  whole  race  had  citizenship  thrust  upon  it. 
Then  the  fearful  era  of  "reconstruction"  followed;  and, 
since  that  time,  all  kinds  of  small  men  in  all  kinds  of  big 
places  have  been  trying  to  solve,  in  a  day  or  a  month,  prob- 
lems that  would  baffle  the  wisdom  of  Washington,  Hamil- 
ton, Jefferson,  Marshall,  and  other  sages  of  the  republic. 


*Morse's  Lincoln,  vol.  I.,  p.  76. 


THE  PRIVATE  SOLDIER  AND  THE  SAILOR  197 

CHAPTER  IV 
THE  PRIVATE  SOLDIER  AND  THE  SAILOR 

I 
The  Real  Hero 

FOR  forty  years,  the  South  has  glorified  her  generals. 
While  they  were  living,  she  heaped  honors  upon  them, 
and,  since  their  death,  has  built  lofty  monuments  to 
their  memory.  May  their  names  grow  brighter  with  the 
ages!  May  the  names  of  Beauregard,  Hampton,  Hill,  For- 
rest, Pickett,  Stuart,  the  Johnstons,  Lee,  Jackson,  and  others 
be  held  in  everlasting  remembrance! 

The  real  hero,  however,  is  the  private  soldier.  It  was  he 
who  won  the  victories  that  distinguished  his  commanders. 
It  was  he  that  stood  sentinel  at  the  lone  midnight  hour; 
faced  cold,  hunger,  nakedness,  peril,  with  no  hope  of  pro- 
motion or  of  fame ;  pointed  the  rifle,  wielded  the  sabre,  fired 
the  belching  cannon;  defied  overwhelming  odds;  shivering, 
barefooted,  starving — all  for  the  sake  of  loyalty  to  his  state 
and  to  the  flag  of  the  young  republic. 

His  history  has  never  been  written.  His  day  is  just 
breaking  on  the  horizon.  In  these  rapid  sketches,  we  can 
give  but  a  slight  hint  of  his  greatness  and  of  his  achieve- 
ments. Suffice  to  say  that  no  grander,  no  more  tragic, 
figure  has  ever  trodden  the  arena  of  history.  To  the  future 


198  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

we  must  leave  an  adequate  portrayal  of  his  character. 
When  the  poet,  the  historian,  or  the  orator  of  coming  ages 
needs  inspiration,  he  will  turn  his  eyes  to  Manassas,  Shiloh, 
Chancellorsville,  and  Richmond. 

II 

Who? 

Who  was  this  Southern  private?  Was  he  a  loafer, 
wharf-rat,  "bruiser?"  Was  he  a  laggard  and  a  dastard, 
driven  by  a  despot's  whip,  like  the  soldiers  of  Xerxes?  A 
few  such  men  are  found  in  every  army.  Even  the  South 
had  some  such;  but  they  soon  deserted,  and  went  home, 
to  be  pointed  at  and  despised  to  the  present  moment.  Very 
different,  however,  were  the  great  mass  of  the  Southern 
army.  They  were  the  pick  of  the  South,  the  creme  de  la 
creme  of  her  chivalry,  the  flower  of  her  young  man- 
hood. The  merchant  closed  his  store.  The  mechanic  laid 
down  his  saw  and  his  hammer.  The  lawyer  closed  his 
office,  and  the  physician  gave  up  his  practice.  The  teacher 
left  his  schoolroom,  and  the  professor  resigned  his  chair, 
gladly  putting  themselves  under  the  instruction  of  some  old 
pupil  who  had  had  some  military  training.  David  went 
forth  to  meet  Goliath.  The  so-called  "effete  aristocracy" 
of  Virginia  and  other  states  went  out  to  fight  for  constitu- 
tional government,  for  home  and  fireside.  Not  even  Athens 
in  all  her  glory  sent  forth  such  an  army  breathing  such  a 
Spirit. 


THE  PRIVATE  SOLDIER  AND  THE  BAILOR  199 

III 

Why? 

Various  motives  actuate  the  ordinary  soldier.  Some 
fight  for  the  money  that's  in  it;  some,  wishing  to  see  the 
world,  join  the  army;  some  long  for  adventure,  and  so 
dare  the  cannon's  mouth.  Of  money,  the  Southern  private 
saw  but  little;  his  month's  wages,  when  paid,  were  very 
meagre,  and,  after  the  second  year  of  the  war,  were  almost 
nothing.  As  to  fame:  the  private  knew  that  his  name 
would  never  be  heralded  to  the  world,  and  that  he  would,  if 
killed,  probably  be  buried  in  an  unmarked  grave. 

The  question  "Why?"  has  been  already  answered.  The 
Southern  soldier  and  sailor  fought  for  his  state;  went  with 
her  out  of  the  Union;  answered  her  summons  after  she  se- 
ceded and  called  upon  her  sons  to  repel  invasion.  Possibly 
he  was  not  in  favor  of  seceding  from  the  Union.  If  not,  he 
still  felt  it  his  duty  to  obey  her  summons ;  and  this  was  the 
feeling  that  led  Alexander  H.  Stephens,  Sterling  Price,  Ju- 
bal  A.  Early,  Stonewall  Jackson,  Robert  E.  Lee,  and  many 
other  eminent  men  to  throw  themselves  into  the  cause  of 
the  Southern  Confederacy. 

Mr.  Stephens,  for  instance,  was  opposed  to  secession.  He 
spoke  strongly  against  it  in  the  secession  convention  of 
Georgia.  After  his  state  decided  to  leave  the  Union,  he 
went  with  her,  and  soon  became  vice-president  of  the  South- 
ern Confederacy.  Mr.  Stephens  was  a  typical  Southerner. 
He  represents  the  Southern  soldier,  both  private  and  officer. 
The  state  had  acted  as  a  sovereign  state,  with  the  right  of 


200  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

secession  as  one  of  her  reserved  rights,  and  the  soldier's 
duty  was  but  to  obey  her  summons.  This  is  the  whole 
story  in  a  nutshell. 

Some  say  that  the  South  was  fighting  for  slavery,  and  we 
cannot  deny  that  without  slavery  there  would  probably  have 
been  no  war.  The  private  soldiers,  however,  were  not 
fighting  for  slavery.  Probably  not  over  one-third  of  them 
owned  slaves;  few  of  them  owned  enough  to  be  worth 
fighting  for ;  and  yet  we  must  admit  that  fully  seven-eighths 
of  them  were  more  or  less  indirectly  interested  in  slavery  as 
the  economic  basis  of  Southern  institutions. 

IV 

44  Gideon's  Band  " 

The  Southern  soldier  believed  that  his  cause  was  just. 
He  felt  that  he  was  fighting  for  local  self-government, 
the  same  battle  that  his  ancestors  had  waged  in  1776 
against  George  III  and  his  ministry.  The  odds  against 
him  did  not  affect  him.  He  did  not  count  the  enemy. 
As  to  the  overwhelming  numbers  opposed  to  him,  let  us 
quote  a  prominent  Northern  authority,  General  D.  C. 
Buell,  of  the  Union  army:  "It  requiied  a  naval  fleet  and 
15,000  troops  against  a  weak  fort,  manned  by  less  than  100 
men,  at  Fort  Henry;  35,000  with  naval  cooperation,  to 
overcome  12,000  at  Donelson;  60,000  to  secure  a  victory 
over  40,000  at  Pittsburg  Landing  (Shiloh)  ;  120,000  to  en- 
force the  retreat  of  65,000  intrenched  after  a  month's  fight- 
ing and  maneuvering  at  Corinth;  100,000  repelled  by  80,- 


TEE  PRIVATE  SOLDIER  AND  THE  SAILOR  201 

ooo  in  the  first  Peninsular  campaign  against  Richmond; 
70,000,  with  a  powerful  naval  force,  to  inspire  the  campaign 
which  lasted  nine  months,  against  40,000  at  Vicksburg; 
115,000  sustaining  a  frightful  repulse  from  60,000  at  Fred- 
ericksburg;  100,000  attacked  and  defeated  by  50,000  at 
Chancellorsville ;  85,000  held  in  check  two  days  by  40,000  at 
Antietam;  43,000  retaining  the  field  uncertainly  against 
38,000  at  Stone  River  (Murfreesboro)  ;  70,000  defeated  at 
Chickamauga,  and  beleaguered  by  70,000  at  Chattanooga; 
80,000  merely  to  break  the  investing  line  of  45,000  at  Chat- 
tanooga, and  100,000  to  press  back  50,000,  increased  at 
last  to  70,000,  from  Chattanooga  to  Atlanta,  a  distance 
of  1 20  miles,  and  then  let  go  an  operation  which  is  com- 
memorated at  festive  reunions  by  the  standing  toast  of  'One 
hundred  days  under  fire' ;  50,000  to  defeat  the  investing  line 
of  30,000  at  Nashville;  and,  finally,  120,000  to  overcome 
60,000  with  exhaustion  after  a  struggle  of  a  year  in  Vir- 
ginia." 

V 

Mr*  Roosevelt  Explains 

We  have  quoted  General  Buell.  We  have  proved  by  this 
prominent  Northern  general  that  it  took  four  well-fed,  well- 
equipped  Northern  soldiers  four  years  to  whip  one  half- 
starved,  ragged,  barefooted  Confederate.  Let  us  inquire 
the  reason. 

Did  the  South  fight  a  race  of  cowards  ?  This  writer  will 
never  admit  that.  Had  the  Northern  soldier  no  convictions 


202  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

to  fight  for?  Hundreds  of  thousands  of  them  were  fight- 
ing heroically  "to  save  the  Union."  Mr.  Roosevelt  offers  a 
partial  explanation.  He  says  that  the  "militant  spirit  in  the 
Northeast  declined  during  the  first  half  of  the  nineteenth 
century,  in  proportion  as  the  so-called  upper  classes  devel- 
oped along  the  line  of  a  wealthy  and  timid  bourgeois  type, 
measuring  everything  by  a  mercantile  standard" — that  is, 
the  fighting  capacity  of  the  Northern  people  declined  as  the 
love  for  money  grew.  To  this  he  adds  another  reason :  the 
men  of  the  South  kept  up  their  warlike  spirit  by  their  habits 
of  hunting,  riding,  and  handling  weapons  and  horses. 

We  cannot  agree  with  Mr.  Roosevelt.  His  explanations 
do  not  explain.  The  men  of  the  Northeast,  if  they  had  de- 
clined in  military  ardor,  soon  regained  their  spirit;  for  we 
soon  find  them  fighting  heroically  at  Shiloh  and  other  places 
under  Sherman,  Grant,  and  Thomas.  His  statement  about 
the  Southern  soldiers,  also,  is  open  to  serious  question ;  for 
thousands  of  the  Southern  troops  had  lived  in  stores,  offices, 
banks,  and  factories,  and  had  had  little  training  in  outdoor 
sports  and  in  the  use  of  firearms ;  no  more  glorious  rosters 
illuminate  the  pages  of  history  than  those  of  the  Mobile 
Cadets,  the  Richmond  Blues,  Company  F,  and  the  Washing- 
ton Artillery. 

There  are  better  explanations.  There  are  reasons  already 
intimated  or  stated  in  these  pages.  Without  repeating  too 
much,  we  may  say :  the  Southern  soldier  was  fighting  for 
constitutional  liberty,  for  state,  for  home,  to  repel  invasion ; 
and  every  man  felt  that  individually  he  had  an  important 
part  to  play  in  the  great  drama. 


THE  PRIVATE  SOLDIER  AND  THE  SAILOR  203 

VI 

Wearied  Out  By  Thek  Own  Victories 

There  is  a  limit  to  human  endurance.  Even  this  superb 
body  of  men  had  to  surrender.  After  a  heroic  struggle  of 
four  years,  the  174,000  starving,  half-clad  men  could  not 
stand  before  the  million  well-fed,  well-equipped  men  that  the 
North  had  under  arms  in  the  spring  of  1865. 

Can  history  show  another  army  like  that?  Where  shall 
we  find  it?  Call  ancient  Sparta  from  her  tomb  and  she 
will  say:  "With  me,  war  was  a  trade,  an  occupation;  but 
with  the  South  a  mighty  principle."  Ask  Athens  why  she 
fell ;  she  will  reply :  "I  forsook  the  great  principles  of  Mara- 
thon, and  fought  for  spoils  at  Syracuse:  the  South  is 
greater  than  I." 

Greece  has  her  Marathon ;  the  South,  her  Chancellorsville 
and  Cold  Harbor. 

But  for  his  victories,  the  Southern  soldier  would  have 
died  of  cold  or  of  hunger.  By  capturing  food,  clothing,  and 
equipment,  he  fitted  himself  to  meet  the  enemy.  By  leaving 
so  many  supplies  behind  him,  General  N.  P.  Banks  earned 
the  nickname  of  "Jackson's  Commissary."  Guns,  the  soldier 
captured  on  the  battlefield.  Overcoats,  he  threw  away,  re- 
lying on  taking  new  ones  from  the  enemy  when  the  weather 
made  them  necessary. 

Well  has  Charles  Francis  Adams  said  that  the  Southern 
armies  succumbed  to  sickness,  exposure,  starvation,  but  not 
to  defeat.* 


*From  a  speech  made  at  Lexington,  Va.,  Jan.  19,  1907. 


204  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

VII 

The  Soldier's  Joys 

We  have  called  the  Southern  private  a  tragic  figure.  In 
some  aspects  he  is  certainly  tragic.  In  other  respects,  how- 
ever, he  is  a  bright  and  happy  figure.  No  merrier  fellow 
ever  sat  at  the  camp  fire,  sang  in  the  parlor,  or  picked  the 
banjo  at  an  evening  party.  Even  now,  his  bosom  swells  as 
he  tells  us  of  the  "good  times"  he  had  when  he  was  in  the 
army. 

Why,  then,  was  he  happy  ? 

In  the  first  place,  he  believed  in  his  cause.  He  believed 
that  the  South  was  right,  and  {hat  God  was  with  her. 
Again,  he  believed  in  his  commanders.  He  trusted  them, 
honored  them,  loved  them,  and  thought  that  they  were  al- 
most infallible. 

Another  source  of  joy  was  their  unity  of  purpose.  They 
were  controlled  by  one  great  idea,  love  of  state  and  loyalty 
to  her  summons.  This  held  them  together  as  a  band  of 
brothers.  If  some  had  been  fighting  for  slavery,  some  for 
the  navigation  of  the  Mississippi,  some  for  money,  adven- 
ture, promotion,  they  would  have  disbanded  after  the  dark 
days  of  Gettysburg  and  Vicksburg. 

Of  the  camp  life  we  have  already  spoken;  the  soldier's 
accounts  of  it  are  very  entertaining.  Songs,  jests,  anec- 
dotes, reminiscences,  stories  of  adventure,  hairbreadth  es- 
capes— more  or  less  adorned  according  to  the  temperament 
and  imagination  of  each  story-teller — all  brightened  up  his 


TEE  PRIVATE  SOLDIER  AND  THE  SAILOR  205 

life,  and  helped  him  to  bear  his  separation  from  his  loved 
ones. 

A  great  bond  of  fellowship  was  the  mess.  To  have 
eaten  at  the  same  mess  during  the  war  still  binds  men  to- 
gether in  warm  affection;  "messmates"  is  almost  a  synonym 
for  sweethearts. 

All  soldiers  have  some  of  these  pleasures,  and  some  of 
the  foregoing  paragraphs  would  apply  to  almost  any  army. 
A  few  of  the  statements,  however,  apply  more  particularly 
to  the  Southern  soldiers.  No  body  of  men  on  earth  ever 
believed  more  firmly  that  they  were  absolutely  right.  No 
body  of  men,  except  the  Japanese,  ever  rose  so  unanimously 
to  fight  for  their  country.  And,  last  but  not  least,  they 
were,  as  we  have  said,  banded  together  like  brothers  and 
equals ;  and  they  treated  each  other  with  courtesy  and  con- 
sideration. 

VIII 

"What  Is  Life  Without  Honor y 

These  are  the  words  of  Stonewall  Jackson.  In  them  the 
South  breathed  forth  her  burning  question.  Honor,  as  seen 
in  an  earlier  chapter,  was  the  watchword  of  our  ante-bellum 
fathers. 

The  Southern  army  was  an  army  of  gentlemen.  Its  ethics 
were  the  ethics  of  gentlemen.  Even  its  errors  were  the 
errors  of  gentlemen ;  and  the  very  brotherhood  and  equality 
already  spoken  of  interfered  very  seriously  with  the  disci- 
pline and  morale  of  the  Southern  armies. 


206  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

The  Southern  private  treated  woman  with  deference.  He 
was  considerate  of  his  nurses,  and  rarely  forgot  himself  in 
their  presence.  Ladies  who.  served  in  the  hospitals  tell  us 
that  drunkenness  and  profanity  were  almost  unheard  of. 

The  average  intelligence  of  the  Southern  soldier  was  very 
great.  He  was  a  good  judge  of  character  and  of  ability,  and 
soon  took  the  measure  of  his  generals.  His  opinion  of  war 
questions  is  well  worth  having,  even  after  forty  years  have 
passed  over  him. 

The  number  of  educated  men  in  the  Southern  army  is  re- 
markable. Nearly  all  the  colleges  and  universities  poured 
forth  both  students  and  professors.  Five  hundred  students 
of  the  University  of  Virginia  joined  the  army.  All  but  one 
at  William  and  Mary  College  enlisted.  In  the  Rockbridge 
Artillery,  there  were  seven  A.  M.'s  of  the  University  of  Vir- 
ginia, forty-two  college  graduates,  and  nineteen  students  of 
theological  seminaries. 

Remember  the  home  the  soldier  came  from.  Recall  the 
picture  of  the  father  training  him  in  ideals  of  truth  and  of 
courage.  Take  this  man,  then,  the  blood  of  the  Anglo- 
Saxon  tingling  in  his  veins;  give  him  a  great  cause,  a 
mighty  principle  to  fight  for,  intolerable  grievances  to  re- 
dress; stir  him  to  fever  heat  with  a  spirit  of  devotion,  so 
that  he  shall  "shut  his  eyes  to  untold  odds  and  close  his  ears 
to  every  warning  of  policy  or  of  calculation  ;"*  then  give  him 
leaders  that  he  trusts,  loves,  and  honors — and  you  have  a 
picture  of  the  soldier  and  sailor  of  the  Southern  Con- 
federacy. 

•Gen.  E.  C.  Walthall,  of  Miss. 


THE  PRIVATE  SOLDIER  AND  THE  SAILOR  207 

IX 

Christ  in  the  Camp 

Of  earnest  Christians,  there  were  large  numbers  in  the 
Southern  army.  The  Southern  soldier  came  from  a  Christ- 
ian home,  and  was,  as  already  seen,  taught  to  respect  and 
honor  religion.  Probably  no  army  since  that  of  Cromwell 
ever  had  so  large  a  proportion  of  devout  Christians  both  in 
the  ranks  and  among  the  generals.  Large  numbers  of  the 
best  ministers  of  the  South  entered  the  army  as  chaplains, 
preaching  on  Sundays,  holding  services  during  the  week, 
and  following  the  soldier  to  the  front  of  battle,  to  hold  the 
cross  before  his  closing  eyes  and  tell  him  of  the  great  Cap- 
tain of  his  salvation. 

Prayer  meetings,  often  conducted  by  private  soldiers, 
were  frequently  held,  both  in  camp  and  when  the  troops  were 
moving.  Such  leaders  as  Stuart,  Lee,  and  Jackson  often 
joined  devoutly  in  these  services.  Irreverent  and  utterly 
irreligious  soldiers  there  of  course  were,  and  thousands  of 
them.  Gambling  would  often  go  on  within  sight  and  hear- 
ing of  the  prayer  meeting,  and  many  privates  and  officers 
used  to  gamble  freely  when  they  visited  the  cities.  We  do 
not  say  that  the  army  was  made  up  of  saints  without  sin- 
ners, but  we  do  say  that  the  moral  tone  of  the  Confederate 
army  was  remarkably  high. 

Great  religious  movements  used  to  sweep  through  the 
Southern  armies.  The  soldier,  cut  off  from  his  dear  ones 
at  home,  felt  very  keenly  at  times  the  need  of  divine  love 


208  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

and  divine  companionship,  and  found  both  in  the  God  whose 
praises  he  had  heard  so  often  in  the  dear  cottage  on  the  Ten- 
nessee or  the  Rappahannock. 

The  Southern  soldier,  as  already  said,  believed  that  God 
was  with  him,  and  would  give  him  the  victory.  Great  was 
his  disappointment  and  his  grief  in  April,  1865.  For  a  time 
he  felt  as  if  God  "had  forgotten  to  be  gracious,"  as  if  "his 
mercy  were  clean  gone  forevermore."  Soon,  however,  he 
brushed  away  his  tears,  opened  his  Bible  at  another  verse, 
and  started  out  with  determination  to  rebuild  his  home,  till 
his  land,  and  redeem  his  state  from  the  carpetbagger  and 
the  scalawag. 

To-day,  the  Christian  veteran  is  the  pillar  of  our  public 
worship.  He  often  stands  in  the  pulpit,  and  tells  us  how 
to  suffer  and  be  strong.  His  courage  and  his  wisdom  have 
laid  new  foundations  for  the  South  to  build  upon. 

Among  her  Christian  leaders,  the  South  fondly  remem- 
bers, not  only  Lee,  Jackson,  and  Stuart,  but  Polk,  the  bishop- 
general,  who  laid  down  his  pastoral  staff  and  took  up  the 
sword  because  his  people  needed  his  West  Point  training, 
and  Jefferson  Davis,  who,  when  he  heard  that  Richmond 
must  fall,  was  engaged  in  the  most  solemn  ordinance  of  the 
Christian  religion. 

X 

"Pirates" 

We  have  spoken  incidentally  of  the  Southern  sailor,  but 
he  richly  deserves  special  mention.  What  a  halo  decks  his 
brow!  What  lustre  hangs  around  his  memory!  Under 


J.  E.  B.  STUART 


THE  PRIVATE  SOLDIER  AND  THE  SAILOR  209 

such  leaders  as  Semmes,  Buchanan,  Catesby  Jones,  Tatnall, 
and  others,  he  won  a  glorious  immortality. 

"Pirate,"  Raphael  Semmes  was  branded.  "Should  have 
been  hung  at  the  yardarm"  was  the  verdict  often  hurled 
against  him.  If  so,  why  was  John  Paul  Jones's  body  not 
hanged  on  a  gibbet,  instead  of  being  brought  across  the 
ocean  and  buried  with  national  honors  at  Annapolis  ?  Jones 
and  Semmes  were  "pirates"  of  the  same  order. 

Some  stigmatize  Semmes  and  his  crew  as  privateers,  using 
the  word  as  a  contemptuous  epithet.  Semmes,  however, 
was  not  a  privateer,  but  was  regularly  commissioned  by  the 
Confederate  government.  Suppose  he  had  been  a  privateer, 
it  was  preposterous  to  denounce  him;  for  privateers  were 
long  popular  with  the  United  States  government.  Of  John 
Paul  Jones,  the  Revolutionary  hero,  we  have  already 
spoken.  In  the  war  of  1812,  privateers  played  havoc  with 
the  commerce  of  England.  In  1856,  when  the  great  nations 
drew  up  the  Declaration  of  Paris,  the  United  States  flatly 
refused  to  accept  the  clause  which  declared  that  privateering 
was  piracy. 

There  never  lived  a  braver  hero  than  the  Southern  sailor. 
History,  poetry,  and  eloquence  may  turn  to  Hampton  Roads 
for  inspiration.  What  is  more  sublime  than  the  Virginia? 
When  she  steamed  out  of  Norfolk  on  the  8th  of  March, 
1862,  to  dare  the  Federal  fleet,  her  crew  expected  the  vessel 
to  sink  at  any  moment;  they  had  no  idea  that  she  would 
carry  them  across  the  harbor.  They  simply  braved  the 
waters.  See  them  ram  the  Cumberland,  fire  the  Congress, 
and  drive  the  'Minnesota  into  shoal  water  where  the  Vvr- 
14 


210  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

ginia  could  not  follow  her !  The  world  wondered ;  the  North 
was  panic-stricken. 

This  victory  of  the  8th  of  March  was  due  to  the  superior- 
ity of  the  Southern  vessel,  and  not  to  any  lack  of  bravery 
on  the  other  side.  It  was  a  one-sided  affair :  wood  on  one 
side;  thick  iron,  supported  by  a  powerful  battering-ram,  on 
the  other.  The  heroism  of  that  day  consisted  in  the  South- 
ern crew's  risking  the  sea  in  a  totally  untried  vessel,  of  en- 
tirely untried  mechanism ;  while  the  Northern  crew  deserve 
great  admiration  for  fighting  such  a  creature. 

Early  on  March  the  Qth,  appeared  the  "little  Monitor/' 
as  she  is  fondly  called  in  many  volumes.  She  stood  between 
the  Virginia  and  the  stranded  Minnesota.  For  three  or 
more  hours,  these  two  ironclads  engaged  in  a  colossal  duel. 
The  Virginia  had  size,  weight,  a  much  larger  battery,  and  a 
ram;  the  Monitor  had  the  most  powerful  guns  ever  launched 
up  to  that  time,  and  she  could  be  much  more  easily  ma- 
neuvered. Both  crews  expected  their  ship  to  sink  at  any 
moment :  each  was  a  novelty  in  warfare,  a  mere  experiment. 
The  two  vessels  fought  like  hyenas ;  but  neither  could  hurt 
the  other  seriously.  Both  crews  became  exhausted,  physically 
and  nervously.  The  Fir  ginia  had  her  funnel  and  smoke- 
stack shot  away,  and  was  otherwise  more  or  less  wounded. 
About  12  130  or  12  145  p.  M.,  both  combatants  stopped  fight- 
ing. Just  as  the  officers  of  the  Virginia  were  conferring  as 
to  continuing  the  fight,  the  pilots  said  that  they  would  have 
to  take  the  vessel  up  to  Norfolk  right  away  or  wait  another 
twenty-four  hours  for  a  tide  that  would  float  her  into  the 
harbor.  When  the  Virginia  steamed  toward  Norfolk,  the 


THE  PRIVATE  SOLDIER  AND   THE  SAILOR  211 

electric  wires  flashed  numerous  messages  North  claiming  a 
great  victory  for  the  Monitor. 

The  Monitor  deserves  our  highest  admiration.  The  fight 
of  March  the  Qth  was  rightly  pronounced  by  the  Federal 
Congress  "a  remarkable  battle." 

The  Monitor  did  stand  in  the  way  of  the  Virginia,  and 
save  the  Federal  fleet  from  total  destruction.  She,  how- 
ever, did  not  save  Washington,  Philadelphia,  and  New 
York;  for  the  Virginia  could  not  have  gone  up  there  to 
shell  the  White  House,  as  the  Federal  cabinet  so  nervously 
dreaded. 

The  Virginia  staid  at  the  Norfolk  navy  yard  a  month  for 
repairs,  especially  waiting  for  her  shutters.  On  the  nth 
of  April,  she  came  down  to  look  for  the  Monitor  and  her 
twenty-five  wooden  consorts;  but  they  could  not  be  found. 
Again,  early  in  May  she  renewed  the  challenge.  Orders 
had  been  issued  by  President  Lincoln  and  Hon.  Gideon 
Welles,  Federal  secretary  of  war,  "that  the  Monitor  be  not 
too  much  exposed."* 

Some  months  later  the  crew  of  the  Monitor  applied  to  the 
Federal  Congress  for  prize  money  for  disabling  the  Vir- 
ginia; but  their  claim  was  not  allowed,  the  Virginia  having 
been  destroyed  by  her  own  officers  on  May  the  nth,  1862. 

The  South  is  greatly  indebted  to  the  United  States  gov- 
ernment for  volume  7,  series  I,  of  the  so-called  War  of  the 
Rebellion  records,  as  a  casual  reading  of  the  first  hundred 
pages  will  convince  any  reasonable  man  that  the  Monitor 
won  no  victory  except  in  so  far  as  she  saved  the  Federal 
fleet  from  annihilation. 


^Records  of  the  Rebellion,  vol.  7,  series  I. 


212  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

The  charge  made  by  some  Northern  people  that  the  South 
stole  the  Merrimac  is  too  puerile  to  notice.  The  Gosport 
navy  yard  was  abandoned  by  the  United  States  government, 
and  the  Merrimac  was  scuttled  and  sunk  by  the  Federals. 
The  Confederates  raised  the  vessel,  fitted  it  up  with  armor, 
and  called  it  Virginia. 


THE  WOMEN  OF  THE  CONFEDERACY  213 


CHAPTER  V 
THE  WOMEN  OF  THE  CONFEDERACY 

I 
The  Truest  Patriots 

OF  the  great  generals  of  the  South,  much  has  been 
said  and  written.  In  the  following  pages,  we  our- 
selves shall  make  some  attempt,  though  utterly  in- 
adequate, to  outline  the  career  of  Lee,  Jackson,  and  Albert 
Sidney  Johnston,  and  to  give  some  idea  of  the  great  deeds 
of  Stuart,  Beauregard,  Forrest,  Joseph  E.  Johnston,  and 
ether  heroes  of  the  Southern  Confederacy.  Of  the  private 
soldier  and  sailor,  also,  some  record  is  found  in  history;  and 
the  present  writer  has  attempted,  though  all  in  vain,  to 
throw  upon  the  canvas  the  outlines  of  that  noble  and  tragic 
figure. 

The  women  of  the  South,  however,  are  but  little  noticed 
in  our  histories.  They  patiently  await  the  historian's  pen, 
the  poet's  song,  and  the  sculptor's  chisel ;  and  all  these  will 
find  in  the  women  of  the  Confederacy  a  fit  subject  for  their 
art  and'  a  theme  fraught  with  inspiration ;  but  history,  art, 
and  poetry  alike  will  shrink  in  dismay  from  attempting  a 
picture  at  all  complete;  for  to  do  full  justice  to  the  subject 
is  utterly  beyond  the  power  of  historian,  poet,  painter,  and 
sculptor;  is,  indeed,  beyond  the  reach  of  human  imagina- 
tion. 


214  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

President  Davis  said  that  the  Southern  women  were  "bet- 
ter patriots"  than  the  men;  and  Stonewall  Jackson  in  a  letter 
to  one  of  them  said,  "They  are  patriots  in  the  truest  sense 
of  the  word."  No  reflection  upon  the  true  men  of  the 
South  was  intended  by  tr  ese  great  leaders ;  but  they  no  doubt 
meant  that  all  the  women  were  patriots,  first,  last,  and  for- 
ever, and  that  they  had  more  unshaken  faith  in  their  cause 
than  the  men,  and  suffered  more  willingly  for  it. 

If  there  were  few  spies  and  traitors  among  the  men, 
among  the  women  there  were  still  fewer.  If  a  woman  ever 
led  the  enemy  over  bypaths  to  the  rear  of  a  Southern  army, 
tradition  is  silent  about  it.  While  some  men  here  and  there 
are  still  spoken  of  as  having  sent  information  to  the  enemy, 
the  women  are  far  less  numerous.  The  name  of  such  a  wo- 
man is  a  hissing  and  a  byword,  more  execrated  than  that  of 
Benedict  Arnold;  and  her  very  house  is  still  pointed  out, 
almost  as  an  obj  ect  of  execration. 

The  Quaker  poet,  Whittier,  has  immortalized  the  mythical 
Barbara  Frietchie.  For  some  Southern  poet,  the  real 
Hettie  Gary,  Belle  Boyd,  and  other  heroines  of  the  South 
offered  abundant  inspiration. 

II 

Wives  and  Mothers  of  Heroes 

Willingly,  gladly,  though  tearfully,  the  Southern  woman 
gave  her  dear  ones  to  the  Confederacy.  Filled,  thrilled  with 
"patriotic  zeal,"  the  maiden  bound  on  her  warrior's  sasli, 
the  wife  girded  on  her  husband's  sword,  the  mother  pressed 


THE  WOMEN  OF  THE  CONFEDERACY  215 

her  son  to  her  heart,  breathed  a  few  brave  words  in  his  ear, 
kissed  him  a  hundred  times — sending  them  forth  to  fight  for 
state,  for  home,  and  for  loved  ones.  In  their  vocabulary, 
there  was  no  such  word  as  fail.  Hopeful,  buoyant,  confi- 
dent, assured  that  their  cause  was  just  and  that  a  just  cause 
must  succeed,  they  never  dreamed  of  failure.  Men  might 
reason  and  calculate  the  chances  of  deieat;  women,  never. 
A  man  might  argue  that  one  ill-fed,  half-ciad,  half-shod,  ill- 
equipped  soldier  could  not  hold  out  long  against  four  well- 
fed,  thoroughly-equipped  men;  but  the  women  closed  the 
argument  with  an  incredulous  smile,  and  reminded  him  that 
Lee  was  at  the  head  of  the  armies  and  that  God  was  in 
heaven. 

The  Southern  woman  was  thoroughly  informed  as  to  the 
movements  of  troops,  and  as  to  the  details  of  battles.  She 
read  the  newspapers  eagerly  and  greedily,  would  prefer  a 
paper  to  a  good  dinner  if  called  upon  to  choose  between 
them ;  and,  after  the  second  year  of  the  war,  when  both  were 
scarce,  she  had  less  trouble  in  getting  the  paper  than  in 
getting  the  dinner,  but  bore  her  loss  of  dinner  with  Spartan 
fortitude. 

On  all  subjects  connected  with  the  war,  she  always  had 
her  "opinion."  She  "lambasted"  poor  President  Davis  for 
not  permitting  "our"  army  to  take  Washington!  She 
thought  Beauregard  was  the  "handsomest  creature"  and  "so 
brave,"  and  wished  that  he  and  Joe  Johnston  had  let  Jack- 
son take  "old  Lincoln"  prisoner  in  the  White  House.  She 
still  shakes  her  head  wisely,  and  tells  us  what  Southern 


216  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

generals  "ruined  the  Confederacy."     These  opinions  she  is 
handing  down  to  her  children  and  her  children's  children. 

Ill 
The  Recruiting  Officer 

No  fellow  with  a  sore  thumb  and  his  arm  in  a  sling  could 
deceive  a  Southern  woman.  She  would  soon  inquire  where 
his  regiment  was,  and  sing  him  back  to  the  army.  If  some 
admirer  of  hers  was  looking  for  a  bombproof  position  when 
able  to  be  in  the  field,  she  would  make  it  warm  for  him  at 
the  next  "starvation  party."  Just  as  he  was  hanging  over 
the  piano  and  ogling  her  with  devouring  glances,  she  would 
strike  up  a  song  somewhat  as  follows : 

"Wouldst  them  have  me  love  thee,  dearest, 

With  a  woman's  proudest  heart, 
Which  shall  ever  hold  thee  nearest, 

Shrined  in  its  inmost  part  ? 
Listen,  then!  My  country's  calling 

On  her  sons  to  meet  the  foe  ! 
Leave  these  groves  of  rose  and  myrtle  ; 

Drop  thy  dreamy  harp  of  love  ! 
Like  young  Korner,*  scorn  the  turtle, f 

When  the  eagle  screams  above  !  " 

The  young  swain  might  not  know  who  Korner  was,  or  what 
kind  of  turtle  he  must  scorn ;  but,  by  the  time  Arabella  sang 

*A  young  poet  of  Germany  killed  in  the  war  of  liberation. 
fUsed  by  the  poets  for  "turtle-dove." 


THE  WOMEN  OF  THE  CONFEDERACY  217 

the  rest  of  this  well-known  Alabama  poem,*  Jack  would 
hear  a  good  deal  of  snickering  among  the  girls,  and  see  the 
soldiers  present  nudging  one  another.  Among  a  small  class 
of  men,  Arabella  was  one  of  the  regular  recruiting  officers 
of  the  Confederacy ;  the  other  army  had  "bounties"  for  the 
present,  and  pensions  for  the  indefinite  future. 

At  church  on  Sundays,  Arabella  continued  her  work  of 
recruiting.  If  some  young  fellow  that  neighborhood  gos- 
sips said  ought  to  be  at  the  front  but  was  dodging  duty, 
tried  to  be  polite,  and  came  to  help  her  off  her  horse  or 
out  of  the  carriage,  she  would  hardly  give  him  time  to  get 
near  her  before  she  asked  him,  "Why  aren't  you  with  your 
regiment?" 

IV 
"The  Una-owned  Queens  of  the  South" 

Woman's  battlefield  was  at  home,  amid  the  cares  and  the 
drudgery  of  domestic  life.  While  change  and  excitement 
helped  to  keep  up  the  soldier's  spirits,  an  eternal  sameness 
of  anxiety  and  of  dread  weighed  upon  his  wife,  his  sisters, 
and  his  mother.  While  he  was  filled  to  intoxication  with 
"the  rapture  of  the  strife,"  as  the  poets  call  it,  she  was 
bowed  down  with  the  cares  and  the  responsibilities  of  the 
home,  by  wild  rumors  from  the  front,  and  by  a  constant 
dread  of  terrible  news  from  the  hospital  or  the  battlefield. 

No  bugle,  no  drum,  called  her  to  her  daily  battle.  Day 
after  day,  she  arose  from  alarming  dreams  "tired  by  her 

*By  A.  B.  Meek,  of  Alabama. 


218  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

night's  rest,"  to  begin  the  humdrum  life  of  the  farm  or  of 
the  workroom,  and  saw  her  means  of  subsistence  growing 
more  and  more  precarious.  No  Joan  of  Arc  was  needed 
to  lead  the  armies  of  the  South,  and  none  made  her  ap- 
pearance. Few  opportunities  for  fame  or  distinction  came 
to  the  Southern  woman;  her  chief  glory  was  to  be  queen 
of  the  home,  and  to  write  to  her  husband  or  son  that  all 
were  well  and  strong,  and  that  he  must  feel  no  uneasiness 
about  them.  Often  these  words  were  penned  with  trem- 
bling fingers,  and  blotted  with  tear  drops.  In  quiet  and  se- 
clusion, she  passed  her  days,  craving  no  publicity,  and  not 
wishing  to  see  her  name  heralded  to  the  nations. 

Occasionally,  however,  some  heroine  would  all  uncon- 
sciously "wake  up  some  morning  and  find  herself  famous." 
Some  patriotic  song  sung  by  beautiful  lips,  with  a  chorus 
of  blushes,  would  send  a  young  girl's  name  ringing  through 
the  Southern  army;  or  some  Emma  Sansom,*  showing  a 
great  soldier  the  way  to  surprise  the  enemy's  cavalry,  and 
riding  in  front  of  him  on  the  saddle,  ostensibly  as  a  guide, 
but  really  to  shield  him  from  the  Federal  bullet,  would  flash 
all  unconsciously  into  fame  and  immortality. 

A  war  heroine  of  Virginia  is  Belle  Boyd,  of  Martinsburg, 
now  a  town  of  West  Virginia.  She  rendered  such  valuable 
service  to  the  South  as  to  receive  the  special  thanks  of  Stone- 
wall Jackson  and  the  special  hatred  of  E.  M.  Stanton,  Fed- 
eral secretary  of  war.  She  made  her  debut  in  public  life 
by  shooting  a  Northern  soldier  that  addressed  her  mother 
and  herself  "in  language  as  offensive  as  it  is  possible  to  con- 

*The  young  Georgia  girl  that  showed  Forrest  where  to  find  Streight's  cavalry.    See 
Confederate  Veteran,  May  1895. 


THE  WOMEN  OF  THE  CONFEDERACY  219 

ceive,"  and  she  was  completely  exonerated  by  the  command- 
ing officer.  Later  she  was  confined  in  Northern  prisons, 
condemned  to  hard  labor  in  jail,  and,  as  a  special  favor,  was 
banished  to  the  far  South.  After  a  while  she  was  allowed 
to  go  to  Canada,  with  the  threat  that,  if  ever  caught  in  the 
United  States  again,  she  would  be  shot. 

V, 
44  Stitch,  Stitch,  Stitch " 

All  this  anxiety  and  this  responsibility,  without  com- 
panionship, would  have  driven  our  mothers  and  our  grand- 
mothers to  insanity.  Instinctively  they  sought  each  other's 
society.  Those  that  lived  in  towns  and  cities,  or  in  the 
country  within  reach  of  county  courthouses,  used  to  meet 
frequently  to  sew  and  knit  for  the  soldiers.  Coats,  over- 
coats, pantaloons,  and  havelocks  were  made  in  great  quan- 
tities. The  socks  that  were  knit  by  "saints  of  all  ages,"  an 
unabridged  arithmetic  could  not  number.  Click,  click,  click, 
went  the  busy  needles,  day  after  day,  all  day  long,  with 
hardly  a  minute  for  pea  soup  and  corn  bread  at  dinner  time. 
Click,  click,  click,  went  the  busy  needles  again  at  night,  till 
the  "Confederate  candle"*  burned  to  a  frazzle,  or  till  old 
grandmother's  spectacles  fell  off  as  she  dozed  in  her  chair, 

*A  "  Confederate  candle"  was  made  of  porous  cord  of  various  sizes,  saturated  in 
beeswax  and  wound  on  a  spool  or  on  a  stick.  The  spool  could  of  course  stand  on  one 
end;  the  stick  was  put  on  a  wooden  stand.  The  end  of  the  string  had  to  be  manipu- 
lated with  the  fingers  at  short  intervals,  making  the  whole  matter  very  troublesome. 
Sometimes  the  whole  apparatus  would  catch  on  fire  and  go  up  in  smoke,  leaving  the 
family  in  Egyptian  darkness  for  the  rest  of  the  night. 


220  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

and  Mother  and  Auntie  said  it  was  time  to  go  to  bed  and 
get  a  good  night's  rest. 

Along  with  these  socks,  went  oftentimes  a  pretty  necktie, 
a  handkerchief,  a  pair  of  knit  gloves,  and  a  piece  of  paper 
carefully  folded,  on  which  was  written  in  a  smooth,  ladylike 
hand — not  the  great  big  hand  now  in  vogue — some  message 
of  love  or  a  text  of  scripture;  such  as, 

"The  L,ord  is  my  shepherd;  I  shall  not  want." 

Oftentimes,  the  hands  that  made  these  garments  milked 
the  cows,  planted  and  hoed  the  vegetables,  and  made  crops 
to  feed  the  family.  In  numberless  cases,  these  women  su- 
perintended the  work  of  the  servants  on  the  farms  and  the 
plantations,  and  thus  furnished  food,  not  only  for  them- 
selves, their  children  and  servants,  but  for  the  soldiers  in 
camp  and  at  the  front  of  battle. 

As  said  in  another  chapter,  it  was  often  a  woman's  hand 
that  led  out  the  dark  battalions,  and  her  brain  that  made  the 
plans  for  feeding  and  clothing  the  helpless  little  ones  and  the 
equally  helpless  servants.  In  docility  and  obedience  for  the 
most  part,  these  faithful  creatures  performed  their  daily 
labors.  Regularly  and  sincerely  they  inquired  about 
"Marster,"  "Marse  Tom,"  "Marse  Henry,"  and  many  were 
deeply  distressed  at  the  sad  news  that  too  often  came  from 
the  battlefield.  Of  very  serious  insult  offered  these  defense- 
less women  by  the  negroes,  there  is  no  record ;  a  few  cases 
such  as  we  often  read  of  now  would  have  disbanded  the 
armies  of  the  Confederacy,  and  privates  and  officers  would 


THE  WOMEN  OF  THE  CONFEDERACY  221 

have  vied  with  each  other  in  leaving  the  army  in  order  to 
protect  their  homes  from  insult  worse  than  that  which  pro- 
duced secession. 

VI 

"Gallant  Black  Tom"  and  Treacherous  Isaac 

The  friendly  relations  between  the  races  were  for  the 
most  part  undisturbed.  Where  the  Federal  army  passed, 
'however,  some  change  was  noticed.  Some  few  servants 
became  insolent,  and  a  good  many  were  unwilling  to  work 
as  usual.  Large  numbers  on  the  other  hand,  clung  to  their 
"white  folks"  with  noble  fidelity.  "I'll  eat  dirt  and  sleep  in 
de  leaves,  'fore  I'll  leave  my  ole  Mistis  and  my  young 
Missy,"  said  gallant  "black  Tom"  one  morning,  when  told 
by  the  Federals  that  he  was  free.  Of  treachery  worthy  of 
an  Indian,  however,  we  had  some  cases,  notably  that  of  Gil- 
more  Simms's  body-servant  Isaac.  Though  South  Carolina 
was  doomed  beforehand  to  havoc  and  destruction,  orders 
were  given  by  the  promoters  of  the  brave  "March  through 
Georgia"  to  spare  Simms's  house,  on  the  ground  that  he  did 
not  belong  to  the  South  alone,  but  to  the  whole  country. 
This  order  was  obeyed.  The  house  and  library  were  spared 
by  the  enemy.  A  few  months  later,  however,  before  Mr. 
Simms  could  bring  his  family  home,  it  was  burned  by  Isaac, 
to  whom  the  great  litterateur  had  ever  been  a  kind  and  a  hu- 
mane master. 

One  of  the  marvels  of  history  is  the  fidelity  of  the  South- 
ern negro  to  his  master  during  that  awful  era.  This  fidelity 


222  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

is  appreciated  in  the  South,  and  makes  the  relations  be- 
tween many  old  colored  people  and  their  white  neighbors 
very  tender.  The  old  colored  women,  not  being  politicians, 
seem  to  feel  closer  to  the  whites.  To  meet  "old  Mammy" 
is  a  great  treat  to  many  of  this  writer's  generation ;  and  the 
good  creature's  eye  glistens  as  she  tells  her  friends,  "This 
is  one  of  my  white  chillun."  Unfortunately  these  old  mam- 
mies are  dying  off,  and  their  places  are  being  left  vacant. 

VII 

War  Poets  of  the  South 

As  Greece  had  her  Tyrtaeus  and  Germany  her  Arndt, 
Korner,  and  others  to  stir  their  soldiers  with  patriotic  odes, 
so  the  South  had  her  Timrod,  her  Hayne,  her  Thompson, 
her  McCabes,  her  Randall,  her  Simms,  her  Cooke,  her  Ryan, 
and  other  poets.  Women  also  touched  the  lyre,  and  thrilled 
the  Southern  heart.  Catherine  Warfield,  Margaret  Pres- 
ton, Fanny  Downing,  Mary  B.  Clarke,  and  other  gifted 
women  wrote  songs  that  were  worth  many  regiments  to  the 
Confederate  armies.  Many  of  their  poems  stir  our  pulses 
even  in  these  piping  days  of  peace,  and  they  are  invaluable 
to  the  student  of  that  fearful  revolution.  They  should  be 
read  and  memorized  by  our  children  and  our  children's 
children.  As  every  English  child  knows  the  Battle  of  the 
Baltic,  the  Revenge,  and  many  other  such  ballads;  as  Ger- 
man children  know  the  Sword  Song,  What  Is  the  German's 
Fatherland?,  and  other  heroic  songs;  so  our  Southern  child- 


THE  WOMEN  OF  THE  CONFEDERACY  223 

ren  should  know  Maryland,  My  Maryland,  the  Sword  of 
Lee,  Catherine  Warfield's  Manassas,  the  Song  of  the  Snow, 
Somebody's  Darling,  and  other  poems  that  compress  into  a 
few  lines  whole  libraries  of  history  and  whole  centuries  of 
woe. 

VIII 
" Starvation  Parties" 

All  shadow  and  no  sunshine  would  make  a  nation  of 
idiots  and  madmen.  Relief  there  must  be  or  the  o'er- 
charged  heart  will  break,  and  reason  forsake  her  seat.  In 
self-defense,  therefore,  the  younger  women  of  the  South, 
wherever  possible,  and  when  no  fresh  sorrow  prevented, 
used  to  come  together  to  sing,  play  games,  talk  and  dance 
with  one  another,  or  with  the  beardless  boys  of  fifteen  or 
sixteen,  slurred  as  "trundle-bed  trash"  after  the  return  of 
peace  made  them  no  longer  needed.  If  one  or  two  of  the 
soldier  boys  happened  to  be  at  home  on  a  furlough  or  on 
sick  leave,  what  a  charm  would  be  added  to  the  entertain- 
ment! What  a  hero  in  the  parlor!  How  the  fair  maids 
would  hang  upon  his  lips  as  he  graphically  described  his  last 
battle,  told  how  he  captured  a  "whole  company  of  Yankees," 
and,  like  Goldsmith's  old  soldier,  "shouldered  his  crutch,  to 
show  how  fields  were  won."  If  he  had  a  voice,  how  beauti- 
fully his  baritone  or  his  tenor  would  blend  with  Lucy's  so- 
prano, Julia's  alto,  and  Alice's  contralto.  While  the  dancing 
was  going  on,  the  old  folks  did  not  come  into  the  parlor; 


224  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

for  many  hearts  were  too  anxious  and  too  sad  to  care  for 
dancing.  But — 

"Music  hath  charms  to  soothe  a  savage  breast, 
To  soften  rocks  or  bend  a  knotted  oak," 

as  the  poet  says ;  and  soon  the  old  gentleman,  the  old  lady, 
the  maiden  aunt,  the  sick  cousin  from  the  country,  a  good 
many  neighbors,  not  forgetting  the  Rev.  Dr.  Hipkins,  kiss- 
ing pastor  of  half  the  pretty  girls  in  the  neighborhood — 
all  came  pouring  in  to  hear  the  music.  When  This  Cruel 
War  is  Over,  Maryland,  My  Maryland,  the  Bonnie  Blue 
Flag,  Dixie,  Her  Bright  Smile  Haunts  Me  Still,  Lorena, 
Stonewall  Jackson's  Way,  and  other  favorite  melodies,  kept 
the  whole  neighborhood  awake  until  an  unearthly  hour  be- 
tween night  and  morning. 

Rarely  was  that  music  stopped  by  a  call  to  supper.  Those 
singers  neither  wet  their  whistles  nor  filled  up  the  vacuum 
below  the  diaphragm.  Those  were  "water  parties,"  or 
"starvation  parties."  It  was  always  Lent;  self-denial,  fast- 
ing, was  the  order  of  the  day.  Happy  were  those  people 
that  had  had  two  decent  meals,  "let  alone"  expecting  any- 
thing after  supper. 

Sometimes,  however,  there  would  be  a  sort  of  subscrip- 
tion party,  each  family  interested  contributing  one  or  two 
dishes,  puddings,  and  so  forth.  "Sorghum  puddings?"  do 
you  ask?  Goodness  gracious!  Or  one  of  those  delicious 
puddings  that  a  South  Carolina  lady  who  refugeed  in  Char- 
lotte, North  Carolina,  during  the  war  called  a  "master- 


JOS  I£l 'II   Li.  JOHNSTON 


225 


piece  of  the  culinary  art" — a  dish  so  tempting  that  we  re- 
serve it  for  a  later  paragraph. 

IX 
"A  Ministering  Angel  Thou" 

Self-denial,  we  said,  was  the  order  of  the  day.  Yes,  self- 
denial  in  a  thousand  forms;  some  of  it  unavoidable,  but 
much  of  it  voluntary.  Women  delicately  reared  tore  the 
carpets  from  their  floors  and  made  blankets  (so-called)  for 
the  soldiers.  Planters  stopped  raising  cotton  as  a  selling 
crop,  and  raised  grain  to  feed  the  armies.  Ladies  sold  their 
jewelry,  and  would  have  cut  tha  hair  off  their  heads,  if  the 
plan  suggested  by  a  niece  of  President  Madison,  to  sell  the 
hair  in  order  to  raise  money  for  the  Confederacy,  had  been 
thought  practicable. 

All  this  time,  the  women  of  the  South  kept  up  a  brave 
heart  and  had  no  idea  of  failure.  Their  hopeful  letters  to 
friends  and  loved  ones  at  the  front  inspired  the  soldiers, 
nerved  them  for  greater  effort,  and  gave  them  fortitude 
under  sufferings  and  reverses.  So  well  was  this  known 
that  all  through  Georgia  and  South  Carolina  Sherman's 
"triumphal"  heroes  told  Southern  ladies,  "You  women  could 
have  stopped  this  war  long  ago  if  you  had  chosen  to  do  so." 

The  queen  of  the  home,  she  was  in  the  hospital  an  angel 
of  mercy.  Eternity  alone  can  gauge  the  work  done  by  the 
Southern  woman  in  relieving  pain,  in  comforting  the  weary, 
and  in  robbing  death  of  some  of  its  terrors.  Friend  and 
foe  alike  received  her  tender  ministrations.  The  wounded, 
15 


226  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

she  cheered  and  entertained  with  an  ease  and  a  grace  that 
Southern  women  have  always  been  known  for;  before  the 
dying  eyes,  she  held  up  the  cross  of  Him  who  "went  about 
doing  good;"  and  the  dead  she  saw  decently  buried  and,  if 
no  minister  could  be  found,  would  herself  read  a  part  of  the 
funeral  service  over  his  remains  rather  than  let  him  go 
without  Christian  burial. 

She  wrote  letters  home  for  the  sick  ana  the  wounded,  and 
added  a  cheering  word  of  her  own.  To  bereaved  ones  far 
away,  she  wrote  tenderly  and  sympathetically,  in  words  that 
only  a  Christian  and  a  lady  could  command,  telling  them  of 
the  dead  boy's  last  hours,  of  his  last  messages  to  dear  ones 
at  home,  of  his  trust  in  a  Saviour's  love,  and  of  the  last 
words  that  indicated  a  triumphant  death. 

X 

Ctspid  and  "General  Lee's  Socks" 

Even  hospital  life  had  its  sunshine,  its  brighter  aspects. 
[Romance  sometimes  entered  those  halls  of  pain  and  of 
suffering;  for,  after  the  darts  of  the  enemy  had  been  pulled 
out  and  the  soldier  was  being  nursed  back  to  health  and 
vigor,  the  blind  god  Cupid  would  enter  the  hospital  and  hurl 
a  dart  at  him,  and  give  him  a  wound  from  which  he  never 
recovered.  To  make  myself  clearer  to  the  young  and  hith- 
erto unbounded  reader :  the  soldiers  often  fell  in  love  with 
the  ladies  that  nursed  them — pity  being  akin  to  love,  and 
gratitude  greatly  promoting  the  tender  passion — the  two 
were  drawn  into  the  snares  of  Cupid,  and  as  a  result  there 


THE  WOMEN  OF  THE  CONFEDERACY  227 

were  many  marriages  "before  that  cruel  war  was  over." 
Difference  in  age  did  not  balk  Cupid,  a  good  many  young 
fellows  being  so  grateful  as  to  marry  ladies  as  old  as  theif 
mothers,  or  certainly  as  old  as  their  "old  maid  sisters." 

In  one  of  the  largest  hospitals  of  Virginia,  much  fun  was 
afforded  by  "General  Lee's  socks."  They  acted,  also,  as  a 
fine  recruiting  officer.  Of  these  articles  of  apparel,  Miss 
Emily  Mason,  a  survivor  of  the  old  "effete  aristocracy," 
and  one  of  the  "angels  of  mercy,"  gives  ans  interesting  ac- 
count in  the  Charleston  News  and  Courier.  Mrs.  Lee,  it 
seems,  once  sent  Miss  Mason  some  of  the  General's  socks, 
too  much  darned  to  be  comfortable.  These  were  kept  by  the 
nurses  to  lend  to  any  soldier  well  enough  to  return  to  duty 
but  not  especially  eager  to  do  so.  They  hurt  his  feet  so  much 
that  he  could  hardly  walk ;  and  the  other  soldiers  soon  saw 
that  he  was  wearing  the  famous  socks,  and  they  enjoyed  the 
joke  immensely.  A  word  to  the  wise  being  sufficient,  the 
well  soldier  soon  returned  to  the  post  of  duty ;  and,  after  a 
while,  the  mere  offer  of  these  socks  was  considered  as  an 
official  discharge  from  the  hospital  and  as  an  invitation 
from  the  ladies  to  go  back  to  his  regiment. 

XI 

A  Starving  Nation 

As  the  war  went  on,  starvation  literally  stared  the  whole 
South  in  the  face.  Not  only  the  soldiers,  but  the  women 
and  children,  also,  often  suffered  the  pangs  of  hunger.  Long 
marches  were  made  by  troops  on  little  or  no  nourishment; 


228  HALF-HOURS  JN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

for  a  soldier's  knapsack  often  contained  nothing  to  eat  ex- 
cept a  few  handfuls  of  parched  corn,  and  many  men  died 
from  slow  starvation. 

At  home,  the  families  of  these  men  had  a  life-and-death 
struggle  to  keep  the  wolf  from  the  door.  After  the  second 
year  of  the  war,  the  suffering  in  many  homes  was  terrible. 
Flour  and  sugar  oftentimes  were  unknown  quantities.  Corn 
meal  was  gladly  eaten  by  the  most  fragile  women;  for  su- 
gar and  syrup,  the  usual  substitute  was  sorghum,  made  from 
home-grown  sugar  cane.  A  chest  of  light  brown  sugar 
gotten  through  the  blockade,  a  man  of  means  regarded  as  a 
great  bonanza.  Peas  were  used  considerably  instead  of 
flour  and  meal  and  had  to  be  given  to  convalescents.  The 
ill  very  often  suffered  for  food  to  tempt  the  palate.  Corn 
meal  was  cooked  in  every  way  imaginable,  "rebel  bread" 
and  "Beauregard  cakes"  being  very  popular.  "Excellent 
poundcake,"  too.,  was  made  of  corn  meal. 

"A  masterpiece  of  the  culinary  art"  was  a  "fine  pudding" 
(sic}  made  of  corn  meal  and  dried  apples  boiled  together, 
and  eaten  with  a  sauce  of  butter  and  sorghum. 

Coffee  passed  out  of  memory.  Even  the  Rio,  generally 
so  distasteful  to  the  higher  classes,  would  have  been  greatly 
relished.  The  usual  substitute  for  coffee  were  meal,  sweet 
potatoes,  wheat,  rye,  peanuts,  chestnuts,  and  okra  seed — all 
parched. 

In  numberless  homes,  tea,  also,  faded  almost  out  of  mem- 
ory. For  black  tea,  blackberry  leaves  were  used ;  for  green, 
holly  leaves.  A  good  many  used  sassafras.  "Fodder  tea" 
was  used  in  some  families. 


THE  WOMEN  OF  THE  CONFEDERACY  229 

To  get  two  meals  a  day  of  such  stuff,  with  an  occasional 
slice  of  fat  bacon,  many  were  truly  thankful.  As  a  result 
of  eating  salt  meat  so  constantly,  many  refined  women  suf- 
fered with  scurvy  and  kindred  diseases. 

All  these  and  other  privations,  the  women  of  the  South 
bore  unmurmuringly.  They  thanked  God  that  they  could 
exist,  and  let  the  men  stay  at  the  front,  to  fight  for  home, 
loved  ones,  and  freedom.  A  mother  and  several  daughters 
who  belonged  to  a  family  known  to  every  schoolboy  in 
America,*  and  who. had  sent  five  sons  and  brothers  into  the 
army,  used  to  sing  their  "grace"  in  Richmond  over  "pea- 
soup  and  corn  bread  for  breakfast,  corn  bread  and  pea-soup 
for  dinner." 

Medicines,  also,  became  very  scarce  and  very  expensive. 
The  United  States  made  quinine  "contraband  of  war,"  that 
is,  would  not  let  it  come  through  the  lines  to  relieve  the 
soldiers.  Of  course,  soldiers,  non-combatants,  women 
and  children  all  suffered  immeasurably.  A  substitute  for 
quinine  was  dogwood  and  poplar,  boiled  strong,  and  made 
into  a  paste.  Home-made  mustard,  opium,  and  castor  oil 
were  tried  in  some  places;  with  what  highly  beneficial  re- 
sults, one  may  imagine. 

At  such  sufferings,  the  demons  in  Hades  must  have  shiv- 
ered with  horror;  but 


"Man's  inhumanity  to  man 
Makes  countless  thousands  mourn." 


*But  almost  ignored  by  the  Encyclopedia  Britannica.    (See  pages  101,  102.) 


230  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 


XII 


The  u  Triumphal  March"  Through  Georgia 

On  May  4,  1864,  simultaneously  by  the  watch,  General 
Grant  moved  upon  Lee  and  Richmond;  Gen.  W.  T.  Sher- 
man, upon  Joseph  E.  Johnston  and  Atlanta.  In  spite  of 
overwhelming  odds,  Joe  Johnston,  that  "great  master  of 
logistics",*  skillfully  eluded  Sherman,  and  struck  him  se- 
verely without  bringing  on  a  general  engagement.  Hood, 
superseding  Johnston,  surrendered  Atlanta;  and  Sherman, 
having  seized  the  granary  of  the  Southern  Confederacy,  de- 
termined to  march  north,  via  Savannah,  Charleston,  and 
Columbia,  unite  with  Grant  and  "get  Lee  beeween  his  thumb 
and  his  forefinger."!  Sherman's  march  through  Georgia, 
in  which  he  consumed  twenty  million  dollars'  worth  of 
property  and  destroyed  four  times  as  much,  is  vividly  por- 
trayed in  some  histories  and  encyclopedias  as  a  "triumphal 
march;"  and  Northern  poets  surprised  Sherman  by  singing 
him  into  immortality.! 

All  this  is  written  in  letters  of  blood  and  agony  upon  the 
hearts  of  Southern  women.  Their  sufferings,  their 
fears,  their  unutterable  dread,  no  pen  can  describe,  and 
imagination  itself  turns  pale  with  despair  when  asked  to 
depict  these  horrors.  As  to  whether  Halleck  and  Sherman 
intended  that  their  plan  of  campaign  should  be  so  interpreted 

*This  compliment  is  quoted  from  Gen.  Richard  Taylor,  the  eminent  soldier. 

t  See  Appleton's  Cyclopedia  Amer.  Biog.,  V,  p.  505,  for  a  very  striking  picture  of 
Sherman  showing  President  Lincoln  and  others  how  easily  this  could  be  done. 

JLittle  Laura  Gait's  refusing  quite  recently  to  sing  this  song  in  school  made  her  a 
heroine  in  the  South,  and  the  veterans  conferred  great  honors  upon  her. 


THE  WOMEN  OF  THE  CONFEDERACY  231 

and  executed,  an  omniscient  God  has  already  rendered  his 
verdict ;  but  no  one  can  either  deny  or  palliate  the  pilferings 
and  the  plunderings,  the  bullyings  and  the  brutalities,  the 
oaths  and  the  execrations,  committed,  uttered,  and  gloried 
in  by  Sherman's  "bummers"  and  Wilson's  and  Kllpatrick's 
"raiders,"  in  their  "triumphal"  march  through  Georgia  into 
South  Carolina. 

"But  for  these  women,  the  rebels  would  have  surrendered 
long  ago,"  was  a  favorite  ejaculation  of  the  doughty  war- 
riors. "Get  up,  old  woman;  praying  will  do  you  no  good 
now,"  said  an  officer  to  an  old  lady  that  was  saying  her 
morning  prayers  as  the  crowd  burst  in  upon  her.  A  few 
chivalrous  Federal  soldiers  tried  to  stop  these  fearful  bru- 
talities ;  and  some,  secretly  bringing  food  to  those  who  had 
seen  the  last  crust  snatched  from  the  hands  of  crying 
children,  apologized  for  the  brutalities. 

Graves  were  opened  in  the  hope  of  rinding  treasure,  and 
the  bodies  of  the  dead — white  and  black — literally  left  to 
dogs  and  to  vultures. 

In  Virginia,  also,  similar  atrocities  were  committed.  In 
Williamsburg,  the  old  College  of  William  and  Mary  was 
burned,  its  tombs  rifled,  and  its  books  saved  only  by  brave 
and  patriotic  women.  The  noble  women  of  the  place  were 
cursed  and  shot  at,  but  generally  by  stragglers  or  other 
brutes  not  under  McClellan's  control.  The  Military  Insti- 
tute at  Lexington  was  burned,  and  the  Valley  of  Virginia 
so  desolated  that  "a  crow  in  passing  over  it  had  to  carry  his 
rations."* 


*This  classic  phrase  will  make  the  name  of  Sheridan's  army  immortal,  long  after  T.  B. 
Read's  poem,  Sheridan's  Ride,  has  passed  into  oblivion.    When  the  South  produces 


232  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

One  of  the  most  touching  pictures  of  Southern  life  during 
the  war  is  the  scene  around  Atlanta  after  the  fall  of  that  city. 
The  Confederate  authorities  opened  a  provision  store  where 
provisions  were  exchanged  for  minie  balls.  Many  of  the 
nee(jy — and  nearly  all  were  needy — women  of  the  country 
around  Atlanta  turned  out  with  baskets  to  gather  up  the 
balls  lying  on  the  battlefields.  A  perfect  godsend  was  an 
old  exploded  magazine,  around  which  great  "lead-mines" 
were  discovered  by  the  poor  suffering  women.  Great  was 
their  joy  when  their  heavy  baskets  were  exchanged  for  food 
to  keep  the  family  from  actual  starvation. 

When  the  army  passed  by  on  its  "triumphal"  march  to 
meet  the  forces  of  Joseph  E.  Johnston,  a  very  prominent 
commander  is  reported  to  have  said  that  he  left  behind  him 
a  very  able  lieutenant  to  complete  his  work,  namely,  "Gen- 
eral Starvation." 

XIII 

The  Women  Decline  to  Surrender 

Some  grim  humor  lights  up  even  the  lurid  horror  of  this 
march  of  the  vandals.  It  was  reported  that  all  the  boys 
would  be  killed  to  keep  them  from  becoming  rebels  in  the 
'future.  In  some  places,  accordingly,  mothers  dressed  up 
their  boys  in  girls'  clothes.  One  of  these  boy-girls  was 
sliding  down  the  banisters,  and  the  anxious  mother  called 
out,  "Bessie,  my  son,  come  down  from  there."  "Ah,"  said 

another  Poe,  he  will  write  The  Crow  and  give  the  Southern  view  of  the  triumphal 
ride. 


THE  WOMEN  OF  THE  CONFEDERACY  233 

a  heroic  "bummer,"  who  was  paying  his  respects  to  the 
silver  and  other  valuables,  "I  thought  it  was  strange  that 
all  the  children  in  this  state  were  girls." 

Caligula  said  that  he  wished  all  the  Romans  had  one  neck, 
so  that  he  might  use  his  famous  axe  with  great  effect  and 
with  little  exertfon.  A  famous  hero  of  the  "triumphal 
march"  is  reported  to  have  said  that  he  would  bring  all  the 
women  o£  Georgia  and  of  South  Carolina  to  the  washtub. 
Not  all  the  perfumes  of  Arabia  can  sweeten  the  names  of 
the  men  that  carried  torch,  famine,  and  insult  to  the  women 
and  children  of  the  South,  or  of  him  who,  in  his  "Order 
Number  28,"  offered  an  egregious  and  nameless  insult  to 
the  noble  women  of  New  Orleans. 

The  kindest  friends  that  the  famishing  women  and 
children  found  in  the  "triumphal"  army  were  the  horses. 
They  must  have  had  Hebrew  owners,  for  they  carried  out 
faithfully  the  old  Mosaic  command  to  leave  some  gleanings 
for  the  poor  and  the  stranger.  These  kind  creatures  left 
corn  on  the  ground,  corn  in  the  troughs  and  mangers,  corn 
in  the  old  mahogany  bureau  drawers  used  as  troughs  by 
the  vandal  army.  What  a  godsend  to  the  conquered  wo- 
men and  children !  After  the  invading  hosts  moved  on,  the 
wretched,  shivering,  terror-stricken  women  scratched  up 
this  corn,  separated  it  from  the  dirt  and  stuff  into  which 
much  of  it  had  fallen,  and  postponed  a  few  days  what  seemed 
inevitable  starvation. 

As  a  result  of  these  privations,  many  feeble  women, 
children,  and  old  men  actually  perished.  One  of  General 
Longstreet's  brigadiers  said  quite  recently  that  two  of  his 
children  died  from  lack  of  proper  nourishment 


234  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

Salt  became  very  scarce  all  over  the  South,  and  the  South- 
ern housekeeper  was  often  at  her  wits'  ends  to  supply  the  de- 
ficiency. Old  meat  house  floors  were  carefully  scraped  and 
the  salt  boiled  out  of  the  mixed  earth  and  drippings. 

Still  the  "liars"  and  "rebels,"  as  the  "boys"  and  "bum- 
mers" called  our  dear  women,  would  not  surrender;  would 
not  write  the  letters  that  might  have  disbanded  the  armies  of 
Lee,  Hood,  and  Johnston.  The  Grecian  women,  during  the 
Trojan  war,  wrote  to  their  husbands  that,  if  they  did  not 
come  home,  other  men  would  soon  usurp  their  places;  the 
women  of  the  South  wrote  to  their  husbands,  sons,  and 
lovers  not  to  come  home  until  they  had  driven  the  invader 
back  across  the  Potomac.  Again,  the  South  had  no  faith- 
less Helens  to  coquette  with  the  Northern  soldiery.  While 
the  Greeks  were  besieging  Troy  to  punish  Paris,  son  of 
Priam,  for  enticing  away  the  wife  of  the  king  of  Sparta, 
that  heartless  wanton  was  placidly  living  in  Troy,  in  the 
constant  society  of  the  man  who  had  thus  betrayed  his 
hospitality.  The  Helens  of  the  South  regarded  the  foe  with 
unutterable  loathing,  and  only  abject  dread  kept  them  from 
showing  their  disgust  more  than  they  did.  The  few  mar- 
riages that  took  place  between  Southern  girls  and  Northern 
soldiers  after  the  war  were  generally  bread-and-butter  af- 
fairs, Cupid  being  absent  altogether. 

XIV 

Heroines  in  Homespun 

In  nothing  was  woman's  self-denial  more  marked  than  in 
the  clothes  with  which  she  gladly  disfigured  herself  for  the 


THE  WOMEN  OF  THE  CONFEDERACY  235 

sake  of  her  country.  It  may  be  said  without  fear  of  con- 
tradiction that  no  women  in  the  world  have  ever  dressed 
more  tastefully  than  the  ladies  of  the  South.  A  Southern 
girl  in  a  cheap  muslin  is  often  "queen  of  hearts"  in  the  ball 
room  or  the  parlor.  During  the  war,  however,  the  South- 
ern woman  willingly  parted  with  fashion  plates,  mantua- 
makers,  and  milliners.  Dragging  her  grandmother's  long 
disused  loom  out  of  the  dusty  attic,  she  wove  herself  "home- 
spun" for  dresses,  used  old  buttons  long  out  of  fashion,  and, 
when  these  wore  out,  bored  holes  in  persimmon  seeds  and 
covered  them  with  the  same  fabric  that  her  dress  was  made 
of.  Her  grandmother's  old  dresses  were  taken  out  of 
chests  and  drawers  long  given  up  to  moths  and  to  dust,  and 
the  lovely  girls  of  the  South  walked  unflinchingly  up  the 
church  aisle,  flaunting  the  old  gourd  and  the  palm-leaf  pat- 
terns of  bygone  generations.  Dyeing  was  much  in  vogue, 
and  many  dresses  were,  with  the  aid  of  sundry  plants  and 
herbs,  often  changed  in  color  to  suit  the  seasons.  Curtain 
chintzes  were  often  used  for  dress  material.  Late  in  the 
war,  the  mere  wearing  of  clothes  was  all  that  was  expected, 
fit,  shape,  "set"  and  material  being  little  noticed.  By  tacit 
consent,  no  lady  ever  laughed  at  the  costume  of  another. 
The  one  supreme  object  was  to  exist,  keep  soul  and  body 
together,  while  the  men  were  fighting  for  fireside,  home,  and 
country. 

At  first,  old  hats  were  "fixed  up"  and  "made  over"  until 
the  parts  refused  to  hang  together.  Then  corn  shucks  and 
palmetto  were  called  into  requisition.  After  ribbon  was  out 
of  the  question,  hats  were  trimmed  with  dress  goods,  such 


236  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

as  shepherd's  plaid  homespun,  and  with  almost  any  wretched 
stuff  they  could  find  in  the  attic,  or  on  the  shelves  of  country 
merchants. 

Stockings  were  knit  from  cotton  spun  and  twisted  on  the 
plantation.  Shoes  were  made  of  oilcloth  by  the  plantation 
cobbler,  and  fit  accordingly.  Sherman's  "triumphal"  heroes 
had  no  little  sport  ridiculing  Southern  ladies  into  whose 
presence  they  could  not  have  come  except  in  companies  of 
thousands  supported  by  pistols  and  bayonets. 

XV 

Her  Monuments  ano  Histories 

The  surrender  at  Appomattox  surprised,  amazed,  stupe- 
fied the  women  of  the  South.  They  could  not,  would  not, 
believe  that  such  a  thing  was  possible.  Like  General  Tay- 
lor, they  never  surrendered.  For  four  long  years,  they  had 
shut  their  eyes  to  the  possibility  of  failure;  when  it  came,  it 
completely  dazed  them.  Erelong,  however,  their  spirits 
began  to  rally.  They  saw  that  the  men  needed  comfort, 
help,  and  inspiration ;  and  where  else  could  they  find  it  save 
in  the  smiles  of  her  who  had  cheered  them  in  the  long  con- 
flict? The  power  of  recuperation,  of  rallying  after  a  great 
blow,  for  which  the  Southern  people  are  now  noted,  came  to 
their  assistance,  and  the  women  of  the  South  had  no  little 
share  in  that  kindly  gift  of  a  merciful  Providence.  In  a 
short  while,  they  began  to  take  heart  and  to  hope  for  the 
future.  Accordingly,  when  the  soldier  limped  back  to  his 


THE  WOMEN  OF  THE  CONFEDERACY  237 

dismantled  home,  his  fences  gone,  his  slaves  either  gone 
away,  or  waiting  sulkily  to  see  what  part  of  Marster's  place 
"Mars  Linkum"  would  give  each  one  of  them — penniless, 
dejected,  hopeless — the  queen  of  that  once  cheerful  and 
happy  home  met  him  at  the  door  with  a  loving  embrace  and 
a  kiss  as  fresh  as  that  of  the  day  of  betrothal,  told  him  how 
proud  she  was  that  he  had  done  his  duty,  thanked  God  that 
he  was  spared  to  her  and  the  little  ones,  and  pointed  him 
hopefully  to  the  future. 

As  soon  as  she  had  had  time  to  give  an  air  of  cleanliness 
and  of  refinement — not  of  real  comfort — to  the  dismantled 
house,  and  make  the  place,  however  humble,  look  a  little 
homelike,  she  went  out  to  gather  spring  flowers  to  deck  the 
graves  of  the  fallen  heroes.  Out  of  their  first  earnings,  she 
spared  a  few  shillings  to  help  with  a  monument  to  the  "un- 
returning."  From  then  till  now,  her  zeal  has  never  abated, 
and,  on  court-greens,  in  cemeteries,  in  hamlets,  towns,  and 
cities  all  over  the  South,  she  is  rearing  shafts,  statues,  col- 
umns, and  pyramids  of  granite,  of  bronze  and  of  marble,  to 
hand  down  to  unborn  generations  the  name  and  the  fame  of 
the  Confederate  soldier. 

Like  the  great  mass  of  the  old  soldiers,  she  offers  no 
apologies.  She  is  not  sorry  for  the  fight  they  made,  and  is 
sorry  they  were  not  successful.  If  she  was  the  "truest  pa- 
triot," she  was  also  the  "biggest  rebel."  She  has  never  been 
reconstructed.  She  refuses  to  sympathize  with  any  one- 
armed  Union  soldier  that  she  is  thrown  with,  and,  if  she 
can  say  it  without  being  too  abrupt  and  rude,  tells  him  that 
he  would  have  two  arms  if  he  had  staid  at  home  and  "minded 


238  HALR-HODRS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

his  own  business."  Her  opinion  of  "the  new  scalawag"  and 
of  certain  recent  politicians,  speakers,  and  writers  of  the 
North  can  best  be  expressed  in  sign  language,  the  English 
with  its  300,000  words  being  utterly  inadequate.  Her  con- 
tempt for  renegade  Southerners  is  absolutely  beyond  the 
imagination  of  an  unabridged  dictionary. 

She  is  now  organizing  societies  to  save  her  father's  name 
from  being  branded  with  treason  and  rebellion.  She  hurls 
back  in  scorn  the  charge  that  her  father  was  a  traitor  and 
a  "rebel."  Whether  the  people  that  persist  in  making  this 
charge  be  penny-a-liners  in  some  newspaper  office,  or  editors 
of  influential  journals;  whether  they  be  ignorant  and  un- 
cultured "schoolmarms"  in  some  obscure  village,  or  learned 
professors  in  rich  universities,  she  indignantly  denounces 
them  as  slanderers,  and  confidently  appeals  to  history  to 
vindicate  the  name  and  the  honor  of  her  father,  either  lying 
in  a  far-distant  soldier's  grave,  or  bearing  his  "good  gray 
head"  proudly  aloft  in  advancing  years  among  a  people  that 
delight  to  honor  him. 

The  women  of  Carthage  are  famous  for  turning  their  hair 
into  bowstrings,  and  hurling  great  stones  on  the  Romans. 
The  women  of  Jerusalem  fought  like  hyenas  \vhen  the  Holy 
City  was  besieged  by  the  armies  of  Caesar.  The  women  of 
Londonderry  earned  immortal  fame  during  the  siege  of  their 
city  by  the  French  and  the  Irish.  All  glory  to  these,  we  say, 
and  we  envy  them  not  their  melancholy  honors.  But,  when 
Clio,  the  muse  of  history,  puts  her  trumpet  to  her  aeonian 
lips  and  looks  down  on  the  nations  for  a  woman  to  herald  to 
fame,  she  will  turn  the  star-like  glory  of  her  immortal  eyes 


THE  WOMEN  OF  THE  CONFEDERACY  239 

to  her  who,  hungry  and  thirsty  as  her  soul  fainted  in  her, 
clad  in  garments  that  provoked  the  ridicule  of  a  brutal  sol- 
diery, saw  the  bread  dragged  from  the  mouth  of  her  crying 
infant  and  the  fire  devouring  the  home  of  her  fathers,  saw 
the  graves  of  her  dead  rifled  and  the  bones  of  her  children 
exposed  to  the  dogs  and  the  vultures,  and  yet  hurled  defiance 
at  the  brutal  invader,  while  crying,  "Would  God  that  I  had 
other  sons  to  send  to  the  front  of  battle!" 


240  HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 

CHAPTER  VI 

LEE  AND  HIS  PALADINS 
I 

Lee  Goes  with  His  State 

THIS  is  a  book  of  sketches.  Its  object  is  to  pass  very 
rapidly  over  great  wars,  especially  those  treated  fully 
in  all  the  histories.  In  regard,  then,  to  the  campaigns 
of  Lee,  Jackson,  Joseph  E.  Johnston,  Albert  Sidney  John- 
ston, Forrest,  and  other  heroes  of  the  South,  we  shall  speak 
very  briefly,  going  into  details  in  those  matters  only  which 
are  either  overlooked  or  treated  too  lightly  in  many  text- 
books. 

The  first  four  men  named  above  were  "West  Pointers." 
They  were  sent  to  West  Point  by  their  states,  and  their 
education  was  paid  for  out  of  the  taxes  paid  by  the  states 
that  sent  them.  They  were  not  objects  of  charity.  When 
they  left  the  Academy,  they  had  as  much  right  to  resign 
from  the  "old  army"  as  any  other  officers.  Some  \vriters 
of  history  speak  of  them  as  stealing  their  education  from 
the  United  States,  and  treacherously  turning  their  swords 
against  the  generous  friend  that  had  given  them  an  educa- 
tion. 

We  have  already  seen  that  Lee  and  other  Southern  cadets 
were  taught  at  WTest  Point  that  a  state  had  the  right  to  se- 


R.  I-:.  LEE 


LEE  AND  HIS  PALADINS  241 

cede  from  the  Union.*  General  Lee  deplored  secession.  He 
simply  "went  with  his  state."  Most  of  the  Southern  men 
in  the  "old  army"  "went  with  their  states."  As  soon  as  Al- 
bert Sidney  Johnston  heard  that  Texas  had  seceded,  he  re- 
signed an  honorable  position  in  the  United  States  army, 
rode  into  the  wilderness  between  his  post  and  his  state,  and 
offered  her  his  services.  Jackson  was  a  states-rights  Demo- 
crat, and,  after  Virginia  seceded,  accepted  a  position  in  her 
forces,  taking  the  cadets  of  the  Virginia  Military  Institute 
with  him  as  drillmasters. 

All  the  Southern  leaders  believed  in  states  rights.  They 
believed  that  their  supreme  allegiance  was  due  the  state,  and 
that  at  her  call  they  should  leave  the  Federal  service  and 
help  to  drive  back  any  army  that  crossed  the  Potomac.  In 
1 86 1,  few  men  in  the  South  believed  otherwise. 

II 

The  Hall  of  Fame 

In  1 86 1,  Colonel  R.  E.  Lee  was  prominent  in  the  United 
States  army.  He  was  offered  the  command  of  the  forces 
levied  to  invade  Virginia.  When  Virginia  elected  him  one 
of  her  major-generals,  he  accepted,  saying  that  only  in  her 
defense  would  he  ever  draw  his  sword. 

In  the  spring  of  1862,  General  Lee  became  famous.  In 
defending  Richmond  against  McClellan,  he  took  his  place 
among  the  greatest  commanders  of  history. 

Every  student  has  read  often  about  the  Seven  Days'  bat- 

*See  pages  188,  189. 

16 


242  HALF-HOURS    IN    SOUTHERN    HISTORY 

ties.  In  these,  Mechanicsville,  Gaines's  Mill,  Frazier's  Farm, 
Savage's  Station,  White  Oak  Swamp,  and  Malvern  Hill,  it 
will  be  recalled,  Lee  with  60,000  troops  drove  McClellan's 
115,000  men  away  from  Richmond  to  their  gunboats  in 
James  river.  Richmond  was  saved.  The  world  had  a  new 
hero. 

John  B.  Magruder  has  received  slight  mention  in  our  his- 
tories. This  great  engineer-soldier  ought  to  be  immortal. 
When  McClellan  landed  at  the  end  of  the  Peninsula  and  set 
out  for  Richmond,  which  was  totally  unprotected,  Magruder 
with  11,000  men  blocked  his  way  for  a  month  and  held  the 
115,000  men  at  bay  until  General  Joseph  E.  Johnston  could 
come  down  with  63,000  troops  to  defend  the  Confederate 
capital.  General  Johnston  being  seriously  wounded,  Gen- 
eral Lee  was  put  in  command,  with  the  results  already 
stated. 

These  battles  cost  the  South  dearly.  At  Seven  Pines  fell 
the  noble  General  Robert  Hatton,  of  Tennessee;  General  J. 
J.  Pettigrew,  the  great  Carolinian,  was  wounded  and  cap- 
tured; and  Wade  Hampton,  the  Rupert  of  Carolina,  was 
seriously  wounded.  McClellan's  "On  to  Richmond"  made 
Lee  famous.  It  also  immortalized  Jeb  Stuart.  As  long  as 
history  is  read,  as  long  as  men  love  chivalry,  Stuart's  ride 
around  McClellan  will  charm  readers  and  hearers.  To  have 
been  one  of  Stuart's  1,200  troopers,  riding  around  Mc- 
Clellan's army,  being  chased  by  overwhelming  numbers,  im- 
provising a  bridge  from  an  old  barn,  and  getting  back  safely 
to  tell  General  Lee  all  he  wished  to  know  about  the  enemy 
• — this  will  be  enough  glory  for  any  old  Confederate  grand- 


LEE  AND  HIS  PALADINS  243 

sire.  In  this  ride  fell  the  gallant  Captain  William  Latane 
(Latany),  whose  burial  at  the  hands  of  several  Southern 
women  is  famed  in  art,  poetry,  and  tradition.  Others  be- 
sides Stuart  won  fame  by  the  great  ride.  The  "flower  of 
Cavaliers"  was  ably  supported  by  Col.  W.  H.  F.  Lee,  Col. 
Fitzhugh  Lee,  Col.  W.  T.  Martin,  of  Mississippi,  and  by 
Breathed's  (Breth-ed)  artillery. 

McClellan  made  war  like  a  gentleman.  His  letter  of  July 
7,  1862,  to  President  Lincoln,  advising  that  the  war  should 
be  conducted  so  as  to  command  the  respect  of  mankind  and 
the  smile  of  Providence,  is  one  of  the  noblest  chapters  in 
the  sad  volume  of  civil  conflict. 

The  North  mustered  another  army.  This,  under  the 
command  of  Major-General  John  Pope,  was  ordered  to 
crush  Lee  and  capture  Richmond.  Pope  and  McClellan 
must  not  unite  their  forces.  In  order  to  prevent  this,  Lee 
determined  to  feign  an  attack  upon  the  Federal  capital.  On 
August  29th,  3Oth,  and  3ist,  1862,  the  Confederates  under 
Jackson,  Longstreet,  Lee,  and  others  crushed  Pope  on  the 
field  of  Second  Manassas.  Here  "queer  lovable"  Dick  Ewell 
lost  a  leg.  Here,  also,  General  W.  N.  Pendleton,  the  fight- 
ing parson,  made  a  reputation  as  artillerist,  and  Colonel 
Stephen  D.  Lee,  another  artillerist,  "turned  the  tide  of  battle, 
and  consummated  the  victory."*  When  their  ammunition 
gave  out,  the  Southern  troops  fought  with  rocks  most  gal- 
lantly. 

In  this  battle,  Lee  had  49,000 ;  the  Federals,  about  74,000. 

'Jefferson  Davis. 


244  HALF-HOURS    IN    SOUTHERN    HISTORY 

III 

"Maryland,  My   Maryland" 

"Johnny  Reb"  now  crosses  into  Maryland.  If  he  can  get 
to  Baltimore,  he  will  meet  with  a  warm  reception  from 
thousands  of  aunts,  uncles,  and  cousins  in  that  center  of  reb- 
eldom.  Had  not  Randall  stirred  the  Southern  heart? 
Certainly  Maryland  will  rise  up  and  greet  her  sister  Vir- 
ginia when  she  comes  to  drive  "the  despot's  heel"  off  "her 
shore,"  and  to  hurl  his  "torch"  from  her  "temple  door." 

"The  best-laid  plans  of  mice  and  men 
Gang  aft  a-gley," 

says  the  poet.  So  proved  it  with  the  plans  of  General  Lee. 
The  farmers  of  western  Maryland  were  cooler  than  icebergs 
when  the  "rebel  horde,"  as  Whittier  calls  them,  rode  into 
Frederick  town;  they  could  not  understand  that  the  bare- 
footed, ragged  soldiers  of  Lee  and  Jackson  had  come  from 
homes  of  comfort,  cleanliness,  and  elegance,  and  that  they 
had  marched  their  shoes  off  their  feet  and  their  clothes  off 
their  backs  in  defense  of  mighty  principles. 

McClellan  was  sent  against  Lee.  At  Sharpsburg,  or 
Antietam,  on  the  I7th  of  September,  1862,  McClellan 
with  87,000  men  and  Lee  with  35,000  fought  one  of  the 
bloodiest  battles  in  all  history.  Lee  was  supported  by  able 
lieutenants.  He  himself  commended  the  Washington  Ar- 
tillery and  John  R.  Cooke's  North  Carolina  regiment  for 
what  they  did  in  the  battle,  and  Longstreet,  in  his  war  his- 
tory, speaks  admiringly  of  Hood  and  D.  H.  Hill. 


LEE  AND  HIS  PALADINS  245 

After  the  battle  of  Sharpsburg,  Lee  made  a  leisurely  re- 
treat into  Virginia.  McClellan,  for  not  crushing  him,  was 
again  superseded. 

Maryland,  then,  did  not  "breathe"  and  "burn."  She  was 
as  cool  as  an  icicle.  Thousands  of  her  sons,  however,  en- 
tered the  Southern  army  and  navy,  and  the  South  will  ever 
honor  the  names  of  Semmes,  Buchanan,  Archer,  Winder, 
and  other  noble  Marylanders. 

IV 

Marye's  Heights  and  Chancellorsville 

Burnside  superseded  McClellan.  With  100,000  men,  he 
moved  against  Lee,  who  was  entrenched  at  Fredericksburg, 
Virginia,  with  78,000  troops.  Both  sides  fought  with  in- 
trepid bravery.  At  Marye's  Heights,  just  outside  of  the  old 
colonial  town  of  Fredericksburg,  the  home  of  Mary  Wash- 
ington, the  two  armies  engaged  in  deadly  grapple.  The 
Federals  charged  Marye's  Heights,  held  by  7,000  Georgian? 
and  Carolinians,  supported  by  the  famous  Washington  Ar- 
tillery. The  troops  of  Cobb,  Kershaw,  and  Ransom  bore 
themselves  heroically.  Cobb  and  Maxcy  Gregg  fell  dead, 
and  the  brave  Cooke,  of  North  Carolina,  was  severely 
wounded.  Lee  used  only  20,000  of  his  men;  the  position 
secured  beforehand  served  him  instead  of  thousands.  This 
battle  added  to  the  fame  of  Lee.  Here,  also,  appeared 
"the  gallant  Pelham,"  of  Stuart's  horse  artillery,  whose  Na- 
poleon gun  became  famous  in  history,  song,  and  legend. 


246  HALF-HOURS   IN    SOUTHERN    HISTORY 

This  was  in  December.  The  campaign  was  over,  except 
that  the  Confederate  cavalry  under  Hampton,  Stuart,  W.  H. 
F.  Lee,  and  Fitzhugh  Lee  raided  in  the  Federal  rear  and 
caused  great  uneasiness  in  Washington. 

Jeb  Stuart  was  fond  of  a  joke.  He  telegraphed  to  the 
Federal  quartermaster-general  in  Washington  that  the  mules 
he  had  furnished  Burnside  were  so  mean  that  they  could  not 
pull  the  Federal  cannon  to  the  rebel  camp.  Stuart  baffled 
the  small  critics.  They  did  not  understand  how  a  man  could 
combine  mirth  and  merriment  with  high  seriousness  and  su- 
preme ability.  He  is  well  called  "the  Rupert  of  the  Con- 
federacy." If  he  had  lived  in  France  in  the  early  part  of 
the  nineteenth  century,  he  would  have  been  one  of  Na- 
poleon's most  famous  marshals. 

Burnside  disappears  from  history.  In  the  spring  of  1863, 
General  Joseph  Hooker,  at  the  head  of  "the  finest  army  on 
the  planet,"  crossed  the  Rappahannock  river  above  Freder- 
icksburg  and  grappled  with  Lee  in  the  now  famous  Spottsyl- 
vania  Wilderness.  Lee  had  57,000  men";  Hooker,  113,000. 
Jackson  and  Lee  planned  an  attack  upon  Hooker's  right 
flank,  which  was  brilliantly  executed  by  the  dread  Stonewall. 
Alas!  the  price  was  terrible.  It  was  during  this  move- 
ment that  Jackson  fell  at  the  hands  of  some  of  his  own  men 
and  left  a  vacancy  that  was  never  filled.  General  A.  P.  Hill 
was  wounded,  and  Lee  was  thus  doubly  crippled.  The 
morning  after  Jackson  fell,  Stuart  was  put  in  command  of 
Jackson's  corps,  and  charged  the  enemy,  crying,  "Charge 
and  remember  Jackson." 

Lee's  fame  now  reached  its  meridian.    No  greater  victory 


LEE  AND  HIS  PALADINS  247 

was  ever  won  than  that  at  Chancellorsville,  in  the  Virginia 
wilderness. 


"All  the  World  Wondered" 

The  South  had  been  suffering  serious  reverses.  Sidney 
Johnston's  place  had  never  been  filled  in  the  West,  and 
Sherman,  Grant,  and  Thomas  had  been  gaining  advantages 
in  that  department.  Something  must  be  done  to  cheer  the 
Southern  people. 

Lee  again  crosses  the  Potomac  and  "carries  the  war  into 
Africa."  In  three  corps,  under  Ewell,  A.  P.  Hill,  and  Long- 
street,  the  Army  of  Northern  Virginia  marches  into  Penn- 
sylvania. They  stumble  upon  the  Federal  army,  now  led  by 
General  George  G.  Meade.  The  rest  is  familiar  to  every 
schoolboy.  Every  reader  knows  that  the  South  received  her 
death  blow  at  Gettysburg. 

Some  call  this  "the  high  water  mark  of  the  Rebellion;" 
we  call  it  the  turning-point  in  the  War  between  the  States. 
Let  us  take  up  a  few  points  which  are  practically  ignored  in 
all  school  histories. 

First:  Why  was  Lee  ignorant  of  Meade's  whereabouts? 
For  this,  some  blame  Stuart,  whose  cavalry  was  "the  eyes 
and  ears"  of  Lee's  army.  Stuart's  men  say  that  he  was 
busy  destroying  Federal  supplies  and  baggage  wagons, 
while  others  say  that  Jeb  was  playing  pranks  and  was  neg- 
lecting his  business. 

Another  disputed  point  is  :  Where  was  Longstreet  ?  He 
was  expected  to  come  up  very  early  on  the  2nd  of  July,  but 


248  HALF-HOURS   IN   SOUTHERN   HISTORY 

did  not  come  till  the  afternoon.  Again:  Why  did  Long- 
street  not  reinforce  Pickett  in  his  famous  charge?  This  is 
a  hot  question.  With  five  thousand  more  men,  Pickett 
might  have  taken  the  Federal  heights  and  won  the  battle. 
What  then? 

Third :  Why  did  General  Lee's  lieutenants  not  carry  out 
his  orders  instead  of  arguing  with  him,  or  following  their 
own  ideas  ?  By  their  delays,  the  Federals  had  time  to  bring 
up  fresh  forces  and  seize  the  best  positions. 

At  the  end  of  the  second  day,  the  advantage  was  with  the 
South.  Lee's  plan  for  the  third  day  (July  3)  was  to  pierce 
the  Federal  center,  then  attack  Meade's  right  and  left,  and 
hurl  his  army  back  in  confusion.  For  this  great  effort 
14,000  or  15,000  of  Lee's  best  men  were  selected,  and  put 
under  the  leadership  of  Pickett,  Pettigrew,  and  Trimble. 

•This  is  usually  known  as  Pickett's  charge.  "All  the 
world  wondered."  We  may  also  rhyme,  "Some  one  had 
blundered."  After  Pettigrew's  division  was  flanked,  Pick- 
ett was  left  unsupported  and  had  to  fall  back  with  fearful 
mortality. 

The  gallant  Armistead,  of  Maryland,  fell  at  the  cannon's 
mouth,  on  the  heights  of  Gettysburg.  Garnett,  Barksdale, 
Semmes,  and  Pender  were  either  killed  or  mortally  wounded. 
Hampton,  Pettigrew,  Trimble,  Hood,  Kemper,  and  G.  T. 
Anderson  were  more  or  less  seriously  wounded. 

Some  blamed  this  rran;  some,  that.  General  Lee  blamed 
no  one,  but  took  all  the  blame  upon  himself.  To  Wilcox, 
who  came  weeping  to  him,  he  said,  "Never  mind,  General ; 
all  this  has  been  my  fault."  To  the  survivors  of  the  charge, 

he  said,  "All  this  will  come  right  in  the  end All 

good  men  must  rally." 


LEE  AND  HIS  PALADINS  249 

Lee  had  62,000  men ;  Meade,  over  100,000.  The  Federals 
had  both  numbers  and  position.  If  the  South  had  followed 
up  her  victory  of  the  first  day,  she  would  have  had  the  choice 
of  position.  If  Lee's  subordinates  had  carried  out  his  plans 
the  second  day,  Meade's  fresh  thousands  would  not  have 
seized  the  commanding  points  of  the  battlefield.  If  Pickett, 
Pettigrew,  and  Trimble  had  been  properly  supported  on  the 
third  day,  Lee  would  have  marched  into  Washington  and 
Philadelphia.  // — "if  is  a  big  word,"  we  often  say.  A 
Southern  poet  who  served  in  the  Confederate  army  has 
written : 

"God  lives!  He  forged  the  iron  will 
That  clutched  and  held  that  trembling  hill." 

That  poem  is  popular  in  the  North,  but  not  south  of  the 
Potomac.  "God  lives !"  Yes,  the  South  believes  that  firmly. 
She  believes  in  a  God  of  Battles,  and  that  God  rules  the 
destinies  of  nations.  And  yet  the  great  mass  of  the  South- 
ern people  believe  as  firmly  that  the  South  would  have  won 
the  battle  of  Gettysburg  and  with  that  her  independence,  if 
General  Lee's  wishes  had  been  obeyed  as  Jackson  would 
have  obeyed  them. 

General  Lee  is  reported  to  have  said  that,  if  Jackson  had 
lived,  the  South  would  have  won  the  battle  of  Gettysburg. 
The  Southern  people  believe  so  firmly. 

Some  strong  Calvinists  in  the  South  believe  that  Jack- 
son's death  was  a  part  of  the  divine  plan  to  maintain  the 
Union.  A  few  other  men  believe  that  God  used  this  four 
years'  war  to  abolish  slavery.  But  the  great  majority  of 


250  HALF-HOURS   IN    SOUTHERN   HISTORY 

our  people  believe  that  the  failure  to  carry  out  General  Lee's 
plans  and  orders  led  to  the  downfall  of  the  Confederacy. 


VI 


Grapple  of  the  Giants 

Many  lost  heart  after  Gettysburg;  more  gave  up  hope 
after  Vicksburg  fell.  Still  the  ragged  veterans  of  Lee 
would  follow  him  blindly,  unquestioningly. 

A  new  star  had  risen  in  the  Northern  heavens.  In  the 
spring  of  1864,  the  hero  of  Fort  Donelson  and  of  Vicks- 
burg, General  Ulysses  S.  Grant,  was  made  commander-in- 
chief  of  the  Union  forces.  He  advanced  to  the  Rapidan 
river,  to  the  Wilderness  already  so  famous.  It  was  sixty 
miles  to  Richmond.  In  his  way  lay  Lee's  army  of  64,000; 
Grant  had  141,000.  It  will  take  him  eleven  months  to  get 
to  Richmond.  To  crush  Lee,  he  adopts  the  "hammer  poli- 
cy;" will  "fight  it  out  on  this  line  if  it  takes  all  summer." 
He  will  refuse  to  exchange  prisoners  on  the  ground  that  it 
will  shorten  the  war  and  be  more  just  to  the  Northern  men 
confined  in  Southern  prisons. 

Grant  started  for  Richmond  early  in  May.  In  his  path 
stood  his  wily  antagonist.  Whenever  Grant  moved  south- 
ward, Lee  threw  himself  in  his  way,  and  dealt  a  terrific 
blow.  Day  after  day,  in  that  bloody  month,  men  fought  like 
beasts  in  the  jungles  cf  the  Wilderness.  The  scene  shifted 
rapidly  from  the  Rapidan  to  the  North  Anna,  the  Pamun- 
key,  the  Chickahominy,  the  James.  At  Cold  Harbor  came 
the  climax  of  the  duel.  In  about  half  an  hour,  Grant  lost 


LEE  AND  HIS  PALADINS  251 

12,737  men.*  In  the  whole  campaign  from  the  Rapidan  to 
the  James,  Grant  lost  60,000  men,  as  many  as  Lee  had  in  his 
whole  army. 

During  this  campaign,  Longstreet  was  disabled,  and  Gen- 
eral Micah  Jenkins  killed.  Stuart,  also,  fell  in  these  sad 
hours.  While  heading  off  an  attack  upon  Richmond  by 
General  Philip  H.  Sheridan,  Stuart  was  killed  at  Yellow 
Tavern.  His  grave  in  Hollywood  cemetery,  Richmond, 
should  be  kept  green  forever,  a  Southern  Mecca. 

Grant  crossed  the  James  and  laid  siege  to  Petersburg, 
the  key  to  Richmond.  Lee  would  have  let  Richmond  go. 
He  would  have  given  up  Richmond,  united  his  army  with 
that  of  Joseph  E.  Johnston  in  the  south,  crushed  Sherman, 
and  then  confronted  Grant  in  Virginia.  The  Confederate 
government,  however,  would  not  give  up  Richmond :  its 
mania  was  to  hold  cities  rather  than  to  crush  armies. 

General  Lee  saw  that  the  end  was  coming.  He  had  only 
40,000  men;  Grant  111,000.  Lee's  men  were  starved  and 
ragged.  His  wounded  were  suffering  for  food  and  medi- 
cine. His  one  idea  now  was  to  keep  the  enemy  from  break- 
ing through  the  long  thin  gray  line  that  stood  sentinel  at 
the  back  door  of  Richmond. 

April  9,  1865,  came  the  surrender  at  Appomattox.  Only 
8,000  men  were  armed ;  the  rest  were  either  unable  to  bear 
arms  or  had  no  equipment.  "All  was  lost  save  honor." 

A.  P.  Hill  breathed  out  his  noble  spirit  on  the  ragged  edge 
of  conflict.  John  B.  Gordon,  "the  Chevalier  Bayard  of  the 

*Lee's  Lee,  page  343. 


252  HALF-HOURS    IN    SOUTHERN    HISTORY 

Confederacy,"  led  the  last  charge,  and  "fought  his  corps  to 
a  frazzle."    The  young  flag  went  down  in  defeat; 

"Yet  'tis  wreathed  around  with  glory, 
And  'twill  live  in  song  and  story, 
Though  its  folds  are  in  the  dust." 


JACKSON  AND  HIS  "FOOT-CAVALRY"  253 

CHAPTER  VII 
JACKSON  AND  HIS  "FOOT-CAVALRY" 

I 

"Poor  White  Trash" 

A  PHRASE  to  conjure  with  is  "Lee  and  Jackson."    It 
always  elicits  applause  in  the  South;  frequently,  in 
other  sections.     Both  men  "went  with  their  states." 
Each  represented  a  civilization — one  the  Cavalier  and  the 
other  the  Puritan. 

Mrs.  Jackson's  life  of  her  husband  is  one  of  the  notable 
books  of  the  last  century,  and  should  be  read  by  every 
schoolboy.  One  part  of  it  has  been  grossly  misunderstood. 
She  tells  us  that  General  Jackson's  first  two  American  pro- 
genitors came  over  as  "indented  servants/'  and  married 
some  time  after  their  arrival.  This  plain  statement  has 
been  distorted  by  some  writers.  It  has  been  construed  to 
mean  that  Jackson's  people  were  "poor  white  trash,"  and 
that  he  was  a  social  miracle.  The  whole  thing  is  nonsensi- 
cal. Many  fine  men  and  women,  unable  to  pay  their  pas- 
sage, permitted  planters  or  others  to  advance  the  money  for 
their  passage — a  large  sum  in  those  days — and  let  them 
"work  it  out"  after  their  arrival.  The  Jacksons  were  a 
sturdy,  substantial  stock,  which  has  produced  fine,  able,  and 
progressive  men  for  several  generations.  Thomas  J.  Jack- 


254  HALF-HOURS    IN   SOUTHERN   HISTORY 

son,  as  boy  and  youth,  was  very  ordinary.  No  one  at  West 
Point  dreamed  that  he  would  ever  be  distinguished.  Few 
people  in  Lexington  thought  that  he  was  anything  more 
than  a  "cranky  professor."  In  those  days,  he  showed  no 
special  capacity  for  anything  except  for  doing  his  duty  at 
all  times  and  in  all  places. 

Only  when  powder  was  burning  did  his  eye  gleam  with 
a  mighty  lustre.  He  was  like  the  steed  that  snuffeth  the 
battle  from  afar.  His  genius  is  for  war.  It  will  begin  to 
show  itself  on  the  fields  of  Mexico,  when  he  is  rapidly  pro- 
moted for  gallantry  at  Vera  Cruz,  Contreras,  Churubusco, 
and  Chapultepec ;  will  oft  and  anon  give  some  inklings  of  its 
presence,  when  at  the  cannon's  roar  on  the  drill  ground  at 
the  Virginia  Military  Institute,  Major  Jackson  "would  grow 
more  erect,  the  grasp  upon  his  sabre  would  tighten,  the 
quiet  eyes  would  flash,  the  large  nostrils  would  dilate,  and 
the  calm,  grave  face  would  glow  with  the  proud  spirit  of  the 
warrior."  It  will  disclose  itself  more  fully  at  Manassas 
\vhen  he  says  to  General  Bee,  "Sir,  we  will  give  them  the 
bayonet ;"  but  will  reach  its  meridian  glory  when  he  drives 
four  Federal  armies  out  of  his  beloved  Valley,  falls  like 
lightning  upon  McClellan's  flank  at  Gaines's  Mill  and  after- 
wards upon  Hooker's  at  Chancellorsville,  hurling  battalion 
after  battalion  of  the  enemy  back  upon  one  another  in  wild 
confusion. 

II 

Jackson's  Political  Views 

What  led  Major  Jackson  to  enter  the  Southern  army? 


JACKSON  AND  HIS  "FOOT-CAVALRY"  255 

Was  it  ambition?  No;  for,  though  he  might  have  been 
swayed  by  that  motive  in  his  earlier  days,  he  was  now  too 
conscientious — morbidly  conscientious — to  fight  for  any 
cause  that  he  did  not  believe  in  heartily.  Was  he,  as  some 
would  say,  driven  by  public  opinion  ?  As  well  try  to  brow- 
beat the  falls  of  Niagara  or  intimidate  the  rock  of  Gibraltar. 

We  have  Mrs.  Jackson's  statement :  he  "was  strongly  for 
the  Union,  but  believed  firmly  in  states  rights.  If  Virginia 
secedes,  he  will  go  with  his  state."  He  would  have  pre- 
ferred to  fight  in  the  Union  rather  than  secede.  This  was 
the  feeling  of  a  large  number  of  Southern  people. 

Lincoln's  call  for  troops  decided  Virginia.  Up  to  the 
day  of  that  call,  Lexington  was  almost  solid  against  seces- 
sion. After  that,  Lexington  and  the  whole  state  east  of  the 
Alleghanies  were  in  favor  of  secession. 

Major  Jackson  believed,  also,  in  slavery.  Moreover,  he 
owned  a  few  "servants."  He  believed  that  slavery  was 
sanctioned  by  the  Bible,  and  that  it  was  God's  mode  of  chris- 
tianizing the  African.  He  conducted  a  Sunday  school  for 
negroes;  had  his  servants  regularly  at  his  family  prayers; 
treated  them  kindly  and  tenderly. 

Ill 

"  Stone  Wall " 

Major  Jackson  offered  his  sword  to  Virginia.  He  was 
commissioned  colonel,  then  brigadier-general.  At  Manas- 
sas,  July  21,  1 86 1,  his  great  career  began.  There  he  was 
dubbed  "Stonewall."  All  day  long,  that  hot  July  day,  the 


256  HALF-HOURS    IN    SOUTHERN    HISTORY 

men  of  the  North  and  of  the  South  dashed  against  each 
other,  bravely,  madly,  frantically.  The  pent-up  hatred  of 
decades  and  of  generations  vented  itself  in  the  whistling  bul- 
let, the  clashing  bayonet,  and  the  screaming  mortar.  The 
very  demons  of  hell  must  have  danced  for  joy  as  they  saw 
two  great  Christian  civilizations  surging  and  foaming 
towards  each  other  in  bloody  billows  on  the  red  fields  of 
Manassas.  Who,  in  God's  name,  shall  give  account  thereof 
in  the  day  of  judgment? 

Who  is  there  ?  Carolina  and  her  sisters,  led  by  Hampton, 
Bee,  Bartow,  and  others;  Louisiana  with  her  Tigers  and  the 
Washington  Artillery,  and  the  "peerless  Beauregard ;"  Vir- 
ginia, led  by  Joe  Johnston,  and  following  Stuart's  plume. 
"General,  they  arei  beating  us  back,"  cries  Bee  to  Jackson. 
"Sir,  we  will  give  them  the  bayonet,"  answers  the  Spartan 
of  Lexington.  "Look!  there  stands  Jackson  like  a  stone 
wall.  Rally  behind  the  Virginian,"  cried  Bee,  as  he  yielded 
up  his  noble  spirit. 

So  Jackson  became  "Stonewall."  All  other  theories  are 
utterly  without  foundation. 

Who  saved  the  day  at  Manassas  ?  Who  was  the  hero  of 
that  battle?  "I,"  said  the  sparrow,  "with  my  bow  and  ar- 
row; I  killed  Cock  Robin."  There  is  glory  enough  for  all. 
Jackson  checked  the  onset  at  the  Henry  house ;  Kirby  Smith 
and  Elzey,  later  in  the  day,  brought  reinforcements  that 
turned  the  tide  of  battle. 

Jackson  was  at  first  anxious  to  take  Washington.  After 
hearing  the  statements  of  President  Davis,  General  John- 
ston, and  others  as  to  the  condition  of  the  troops  and  the 


T.  J.  JACKSON 


JACKSON  AND  HIS  "FOOT-CAVALRY"  257 

scarcity  of  cavalry,  he,  however,  changed  his  mind.  For 
not  taking  Washington  or  allowing  Jackson  to  do  so,  Presi- 
dent Davis  used  to  be  soundly  berated  in  some  quarters.  At 
the  time,  Jackson  was  eager.  He  wished  to  introduce  then 
and  there  his  policy  of  "ceaseless  invasion." 

IV 
The  True  Stonewall  Jackson 

We  have  The  True  George  Washington  and  The  True 
Abraham  Lincoln',  we  need  a  volume  entitled  The  True 
Stonewall  Jackson. 

Of  no  other  great  man  has  so  much  nonsense  been  written. 
Even  Southern  tradition  has  given  us  a  somewhat  distorted 
picture  of  this  great  hero.  A  few  plain  facts  may  be  given. 

Jackson  is  often  spoken  of  as  a  cold,  fanatical,  cranky  man 
that  would  throw  a  damper  over  any  social  gathering.  This 
is  a  very  unfair  picture.  We  admit  that  he  was  not  gen- 
erally what  is  called  sociable  or  genial.  He  was  a  taciturn, 
self-contained  man,  a  good  listener,  not  given  to  much  talk- 
ing. General  Dick  Taylor  says,  "If  silence  is  golden,  Jack- 
son was  a  bonanza."  Nor  was  he  addicted  to  jesting  or 
jocularity.  He,  however,  enjoyed  a  clean  joke,  but  in  his 
own  way,  laughing  quietly,  and  soon  turning  to  some  moral 
or  religious  question. 

His  home  life  was  simple  and  beautiful.     The  accounts 
that  we  have  of  the  last  winter  he  spent  in  the  bosom  of  his 
family  are  extremely  touching.     His  devotion  as  a  husband 
was  tender  beyond  expression. 
17 


258  HALF-HOURS    IN    SOUTHERN    HISTORY 

His  religious  life  is  often  misunderstood.  He  was  given 
to  neither  bigotry  nor  cant.  He  was  emphatically  a  man  of 
faith  and  of  prayer.  He  believed  implicitly  in  a  God  of 
Battles,  and  always  prayed  for  divine  assistance. 

Some  have  charged  him  with  being  proud,  and  too  tena- 
cious of  his  personal  rights.  These  charges  are  utterly  mis- 
leading. He  did  tender  his  resignation  when  the  govern- 
ment at  Richmond  interfered  in  the  internal  affairs  of  his 
department ;  but  he  did  it  in  the  interests  of  the  Confederacy. 
Some  thought  that  he  was  unjustly  harsh  towards  inferior 
officers;  but  he  was,  we  believe,  never  severe  except  when 
his  orders  had  been  neglected  or  disobeyed.  We  do  not  say 
that  he  was  perfect.  We  do  say,  however,  that,  if  General 
Jackson's  ideas  of  discipline  had  prevailed  throughout  the 
Southern  army,  the  South  would  have  had  not  only  the  best 
fighters  but  the  best  soldiers  in  modern  history.* 

Jackson  believed  in  "war  to  the  hilt."  He  seems  to  have 
been  originally  in  favor  of  giving  and  receiving  no  quarter, 
so  as  to  make  the  war  "short,  sharp,  and  decisive.""  This 
view  he  waived  in  deference  to  General  Lee  and  President 
Davis.  Later  on,  he  seems  to  have  favored  adopting  the 
"black  flag"  in  dealing  with  a  few  special  leaders  of  the 
Union  forces. 

As  to  General  Jackson's  plans  of  warfare:  As  said  al- 
ready, he  was  in  favor  of  "ceaseless  invasion."  He  did  not 
believe  in  trying  to  hold  cities  like  Richmond  and  Vicksburg. 
He  proposed  to  form  movable  columns  of  cavalry  and  horse 
artillery,  to  be  used  in  carrying  the  war  into  the  North, 

*This  distinction,  we  believe,  was  drawn  by  Gen.  Joseph  E.Johnston. 


JACKSON  AND  HIS  "FOOT-CAVALRY"  259 

destroying  crops,  capturing  cities,  and  rarely  risking  a  battle. 
If — (but  there's  the  big  word  'if  again) — Jackson's  plan 
had  been  adopted,  and  such  men  as  Morgan,  Forres-t,  Stuart, 
Sidney  Johnston,  and  Jackson  himself  had  led  these  cease- 
less columns  across  the  Potomac,  the  South  might  have 
gained  her  independence. 

This  is  a  book  of  polemics.  Its  object  is  to  defend  the 
South,  her  leaders,  and  her  soldiers.  We  shall  eradicate 
the  poison  wherever  we  find  it. 

A  popular  ballad  is  Barbara  Frietchie.  Every  boy  and 
girl  has  read  it  and  declaimed  it.  Few  have  ever  seen 
Whittier's  explanations  or  the  refutations  of  Southern 
writers.  Let  us  look  at  it  closely.  Whittier  says  that  "a 
blush  of  shame"  came  over  Jackson's  face,  as  he  saw  the 
flag  of  the  Union  waving.  Does  any  reader  believe  that? 
Was  the  pious,  God-fearing  hero  of  1862  ashamed  of  what 
he  had  done  in  1861  ?  Again,  Jackson  is  made  to  threaten 
with  the  death  of  a  dog  any  man  that  touches  a  hair  of 
Dame  Barbara's  head.  What  language!  What  an  idea! 
No  man  in  that  army  of  Scotch  Covenanters  needed  any 
such  warning.  Another  flaw  may  be  stated.  Dame  Bar- 
bara was  bedridden  and  could  not  have  got  to  the  window 
to  save  her  life.  Another  serious  flaw  is  that  Jackson's 
corps  did  not  pass  up  the  street  that  Dame  Barbara  lived  on. 
The  most  serious  flaw,  however,  is  that  the  whole  story  is 
a  myth,  palmed  off  on  the  poet  by  some  ill-informed  person. 

These  points  have  been  made  in  print  before.  So  strong 
are  they  that  few  now  believe  the  story.  Recently,  how- 
ever, a  prominent  writer  of  history  tells  us  that  the  Barbara 


260  HALF-HOURS   IN    SOUTHERN    HISTORY 

Frietchie  incident  really  occurred  at  Fredericksburg,  Vir- 
ginia— which  we  can  say  is  absolutely  without  foundation, 
another  myth.  Possibly  it  was  Frederick's  Hall,  Louisa 
county,  Virginia.  Try  that ! 

V 
The  Thunderbolt  of  War 

The  Valley  Campaign  is  immortal.  It  put  Jackson 
among  the  great  soldiers  of  Christendom.  Though  treated 
in  some  volumes  as  raids  on  Banks  and  others,  it  is  studied 
in  some  military  schools  of  Europe  as  one  of  the  greatest 
campaigns  of  history.  The  outlines  are  familiar  to  the 
young  student. 

Why  is  Kernstown  immortal  ?  Certainly  not  on  account 
of  the  numbers.  Nor  can  we  claim  it  as  a  Confederate 
victory.  It  is  immortal  because  with  3,400  men  Jackson 
stopped  the  advance  of  175,000  men  upon  the  Southern 
capital.  If  the  Valley  forces  under  Shields  and  others  had 
been  permitted  to  join  McDowell,  and  all  these  had  marched 
to  unite  with  McClellan's  105,000  advancing  up  the  Penin- 
sula, Richmond  might  have  fallen;  and,  at  that  time  in  the 
war,  the  fall  of  the  capital  would  probably  have  meant  the 
collapse  of  the  Confederacy. 

Again :  The  battle  of  McDowell  would  seem  to  be  un- 
important. Jackson  had  superior  forces  and  a  very  ordinary 
antagonist ;  but  McDowell  was  part  of  a  campaign  in  which 
16,000  Confederates  kept  35,000  Federals  from  advancing 
upon  Richmond  and  joining  McClellan;  and  thus  again  a 
few  thousand  men  under  Jackson  neutralized  the  great 
armies  of  the  enemy.  This  was  May  8,  1862. 


JACKSON  AND  HIS  "FOOT-CAVALRY"  261 

Jackson's  victory  over  Banks  at  Winchester  was  worth 
$300,000  in  supplies  to  the  Confederacy,  and  won  Banks  the 
sobriquet  of  "Jackson's  commissary."  The  boys  of  the  Val- 
ley were  in  high  spirits.  The  grandsons  of  the  men  that  had 
followed  Andrew  Lewis,  Daniel  Morgan,  and  William 
Campbell  felt  that  they  had  a  leader  worthy  of  their  metal. 
At  Cross  Keys  and  Port  Republic,  they  drove  four  Federal 
generals  rapidly  to  the  Potomac.  The  "crazy  professor" 
was  now  a  world  hero. 

We  have  already  seen  Jackson  at  Gaines's  Mill,  June  27. 
Some  claim  that  he  turned  the  tide  of  battle  against  Mc- 
Clellan,  and  thus  saved  Richmond. 

Another  disputed  question  is,  Who  planned  the  Valley 
Campaign  ?  Some  say  Lee ;  some,  Jos.  E.  Johnston ;  others, 
Jackson.  Could  any  other  man  in  America  have  executed 
it?  That  is  the  question  before  us. 

"There  were  heroes  before  Agamemnon."  There  were 
other  great  soldiers  in  the  Valley  besides  Jackson.  The 
South  should  never  forget  "queer  Dick  Ewell" — Ewell  the 
Unique — and  Turner  Ashby,  the  cavalier  of  the  Valley. 

Cedar  Run  was  a  noble  victory.  With  18,000  men 
Jackson  defeated  Banks  and  Sigel  with  32,000.  Under 
these  heavy  odds,  Jackson's  genius  rose  to  its  great  propor- 
tions. Drawing  his  sword — the  only  time  during  the  war, 
it  is  thought — dropping  his  bridle  rein  on  his  horse's  neck, 
he  reached  over  and  took  a  flag  from  a  standard  bearer 
close  by,  and,  waving  it  over  his  head,  cried  "Rally  men! 
Remember  Winder!  Where's  my  Stonewall  Brigade? 
Forward,  men !  Forward !"  The  battle  was  soon  over. 


262  HALF-HOURS   IN   SOUTHERN   HISTORY 

CHAPTER  VIII 
SHILOH  AND  ITS  HEROES 

I 

The  Hero  of  Texas 

EVERY  Southern  boy  and  girl  should  know  about  Gen- 
eral Albert  Sidney  Johnston.  His  death  may  have 
lost  the  South  her  independence. 

Johnston  was  born  in  Kentucky,  but  lived  in  Texas.  He 
was  a  distinguished  officer  in  the  "old  army,"  and,  in  1861, 
went  out  of  the  Union  with  Texas.  He  was  a  typical 
Southerner  of  the  old  school.  After  Texas  seceded,  General 
Johnston  forwarded  his  resignation  to  Washington,  but  kept 
the  whole  matter  secret  so  as  not  to  permit  his  rank  as 
general-commanding  the  Department  of  the  Pacific  to  in- 
fluence the  many  adventurous  Southerners  settled  in  Cal- 
ifornia. He  had  foreseen  the  war  between  the  sections. 
While  deploring  the  sad  state  of  affairs,  he  sympathized 
heartily  with  the  Southern  people.  His  dearest  friends  were 
Leonidas  Polk  and  Jefferson  Davis.  As  said  already,  they 
had  been  taught  the  right  of  secession  at  the  West  Point 
Military  Academy.  Johnston  was  of  course  censured  bit- 
terly for  "deserting  his  flag."  Polk  was  censured  for  lay- 
ing aside  his  duties  as  bishop  of  Louisiana  and  giving  the 


SHILOH  AND  ITS  HEROES  263 

South  the  benefit  of  his  military  education,  although  the 
"fighting  parsons"  of  the  Revolution,  such  as  Thruston  and 
Muhlenburg,  are  national  heroes. 

General  Johnston  was  put  in  charge  of  the  Western  De- 
partment. His  centre  was  Bowling  Green,  Kentucky. 
With  only  21,000  or  22,000  men  he  had  to  face  100,000 
under  such  able  generals  as  Grant,  Buell,  and  Thomas.  He 
called  in  vain  for  adequate  reinforcements. 

Grant  was  not  yet  distinguished.  Polk,  supported  by 
Pillow,  Cheatham,  and  other  heroes  of  the  Southwest,  de- 
feated him  at  Belmont,  in  spite  of  overwhelming  numbers. 
Johnston's  thin  line  was  soon  broken.  The  100,000  Fed- 
erals swarmed  up  the  Southern  rivers  and  took  Forts  Henry 
and  Donelson.  Johnston  was  bitterly  censured  by  bomb- 
proof brigadiers  and  editorial  ink-pots.  President  Davis 
stood  by  him  courageously,  and  refused  to  remove  this  "in- 
competent" and  "cowardly"  general.  Lack  of  troops  para- 
lyzed Johnston's  efforts.  Great  generals  he  had  in  abun- 
dance; for  besides  those  already  mentioned,  he  had  John 
Morgan  and  N.  B.  Forrest,  two  of  the  greatest  cavalrymen 
ever  seen  on  this  continent. 

II 
"Freedom  Shrieked  When  Kosciusko  Fell" 

So  says  Campbell  of  the  Polish  hero.  So  say  many  in 
regard  to  the  death  of  Sidney  Johnston.  He  was  the 
brother  of  Jackson.  The  latter  was  Lee's  "right  arm;"  the 
former,  the  greatest  soldier  of  the  Southwest. 


264  HALF-HOURS   IN   SOUTHERN   HISTORY 

Shiloh  was  a  "decisive  battle"  of  the  war.  If  Johnston 
had  lived  to  follow  up  his  victory,  there  would  have  been  no 
Vicksburg,  no  siege  of  Petersburg,  no  capture  of  Richmond, 
no  Appomattox;  Grant  was  defeated  when  Johnston  fell. 
Two  hours  more  would  have  driven  the  Federals  into  the 
river  or  forced  them  to  surrender.  "To-night,"  said  John- 
ston, "we  will  water  our  horses  in  the  Tennessee  river."  The 
Federals  were  in  the  wav  of  the  horses.  "Freedom  shrieked 
when  Johnston  fell." 

Shiloh  was  a  noble  battle.  The  very  flower  of  the  South- 
west was  there  under  Beauregard,  Bragg,  Polk,  Hardee, 
and  Breckenridge.  Other  great  spirits  were  on  the  field. 
George  W.  Johnston,  Provisional  Governor  of  Kentucky, 
fell  on  the  second  day  while  serving  as  a  private  in  a  Ken- 
tucky regiment.  General  A.  H.  Gladden,  of  Louisiana,  fell 
while  leading  his  brigade  with  conspicuous  gallantry.  Some 
noble  spirits  survived  the  battle.  Among  them  were  For- 
rest, "the  Wizard  of  the  Saddle;"  "Little  Joe  Wheeler,"  the 
hero  of  three  wars ;  Morgan,  famous  for  his  raids ;  Pat  Cle- 
burne,  "the  Stonewall  of  the  West,"  who  later  fell  on  the 
bloody  field  of  Franklin. 

Ill 

"Common  Errors" 

There  are  "common  errors"  in  the  use  of  English;  there 
are  equally  as  many  in  some  histories. 

One  of  these  is  that  General  Johnston  exposed  himself 
recklessly  at  Shiloh  in  order  to  retrieve  his  reputation,  and 


ALBERT   SIDXKV   JOHNSTON 


BHILOH  AND  ITS  HEROES  265 

mayhap  show  the  "bomb-proof  brigadiers"  and  others  that 
his  failure  to  hold  the  Bowling  Green-Cumberland  line  with 
22,000  against  100,000  was  not  due  to  cowardice. 

The  whole  thing  is  preposterous.  All  the  prominent 
Southern  generals  exposed  themselves  too  frequently.  Joe 
Johnston  and  Beauregard  did  it  at  Manassas.  Jackson  did 
it  habitually.  Ewell  frequently  rushed  to  the  very  front  of 
battle.  Stuart's  black  plume  was  always  in  front,  just  as 
Henry  of  Navarre's  white  plume  beckoned  his  men  ever  on- 
ward. -In  the  Wilderness,  General  Lee's  horse  was  seized 
by  the  Texans,  who  said,  "If  you  will  go  back,  General,  we 
will  go  forward."  It  was  a  bad  though  noble  habit  of  the 
Southern  leaders.  In  the  early  days  of  the  war,  the  senti- 
ment of  the  troops  rather  demanded  it.  A  sad  experience 
taught  them  better.  The  loss  of  Sidney  Johnston  and 
Stonewall  Jackson  was  the  price  paid  for  their  experience. 

This  custom  of  the  Southern  generals,  even  Grant  could 
not  understand.  He  says  in  his  Personal  Memoirs  that 
the  Southern  troops  at  Shiloh  could  not  have  felt  confident 
of  victory,  as  they  permitted  Johnston  to  ride  along  the 
front  of  battle.  What  chains  could  have  bound  that  man 
after  he  smelt  the  powder? 

Johnston  was  first  buried  in  New  Orleans.  After  the 
war,  his  remains  were  removed  to  Austin,  Texas.  Among 
his  pall-bearers  were  Beauregard,  Bragg,  Buckner,  Hood, 
Longstreet,  and  "Dick  Taylor."  All  but  one  of  these  have 
"crossed  over  the  river"  and  are  resting  "under  the  shade  of 
the  trees"  with  the  dread  Stonewall. 


266  HALF-HOURS    IN    SOUTHERN    HISTORY 

CHAPTER  IX 

THE  SOUTH  SINCE  THE  WAR 

I 
A  Prostrate  Nation 

GENERAL  LEE,  as  already  stated,  surrendered  April 
9,  1865.  On  April  26,  followed  the  surrender  of 
General  Joheph  E.  Johnston  in  North  Carolina;  in 
May,  that  of  General  Richard  Taylor  in  Mississippi,  and 
that  of  General  E.  Kirby  Smith  west  of  the  Mississippi 
river.  By  the  last  of  June,  there  was  not  a  Confederate 
soldier  in  arms  against  the  United  States  government. 
Never  did  an  army  lay  down  its  arms  in  better  faith,  or 
with  more  sincere  acceptance  of  the  terms  offered  by  the 
conqueror.  How  these  terms  were  kept  by  some  of  the 
conquerors,  history  will  tell  in  flaming  letters,  calling  to  her 
aid  essay,  fiction  and  drama,  and  the  eloquence  of  tongues 
yet  unborn.  General  Grant  acted  honorably  and  kindly. 
Mr.  Lincoln  seems  to  have  nursed  no  mean  grudge  against 
the  fallen  foe;  but,  if  General  Lee  could  have  foreseen  the 
events  of  the  years  from  1865  to  1876,  he  would  have  hid- 
den his  ragged  remnant  in  the  Appalachian  mountains,  and 
two  new  generations  of  Southern  youth  would  have  kept 
up  the  contest  to  the  present  moment.  But  for  the  personal 


THE  SOUTH  SINCE  THE  WAR  267 

influence  of  General  Grant,  General  Robert  E.  Lee  would 
have  been  prosecuted  for  treason.  President  Davis,  Vice- 
President  Stephens,  Governor  Brown,  of  Georgia,  Governor 
Clark,  of  Mississippi,  General  Howell  Cobb,  Senator  Hill, 
of  Georgia,  and  other  prominent  men  were  arrested  and  put 
in  prison.  The  greatest  sufferer  was  President  Davis.  His 
treatment  by  some  government  officials  at  Fortress  Monroe 
reads  like  a  chapter  from  the  Spanish  Inquisition  or  from  a 
history  of  the  Indians.  Mrs.  Davis's  account  of  that  treat- 
ment and  of  the  disrespect  shown  her  by  one  or  two  promi- 
nent officials  at  Fort  Monroe,  challenges  the  credulity  of 
mankind.  Mr.  Davis  was  never  brought  to  trial.  The 
United  States  Government  knew  that  an  impartial  jury 
might  well  fail  to  find  him  guilty  of  treason  against  the 
government,  and  that  eminent  lawyers  were  ready  to  argue 
his  case  before  the  world.  The  failure  to  try  Mr.  Davis 
was  a  great  constitutional  victory  for  the  South,  and  pos- 
terity will  so  regard  it.  The  North  could  not  have  proved 
that  he  had  committed  treason  against  the  government. 

The  cost  of  the  war  is  almost  beyond  calculation.  Besides 
slaves  worth  about  two  thousand  million  dollars,  the  South 
lost  values  of  every  kind,  footing  up  at  least  two  thousand 
million  more.  There  was  practically  no  money  in  circula- 
tion, her  banks  had  gone  to  ruin,  her  credit  was  totally  gone, 
all  basis  of  credit  was  destroyed,  her  stocks  and  bonds  were 
utterly  worthless,  provisions  almost  exhausted,  bankruptcy 
was  universal.  The  whole  land  lay  in  utter  paralysis  and 
ruin. 


268  HALF-HOURS    IN    SOUTHERN    HISTORY 

II 

The  Wolf  at  the  Doot 

The  soldier,  returning  to  his  dismantled  home,  saw  star- 
vation standing  at  his  door,  shaking  his  gaunt  finger  at  wife 
and  little  ones.  Soon  a  worse  sight  met  his  gaze :  an  idle, 
shiftless  mass  of  freedmen  hung  around  the  courthouse,  the 
post  office  and  other  public  places,  wondering  when  they 
could  crowd  the  soldier's  family  out  of  their  home,  and 
move  into  it.  Some  of  the  slaves  were  still  faithful  and 
respectful;  many  were  sullen,  suspicious,  grum;  some  in- 
solent. Many  looked  on  with  maudlin  curiosity  and  with 
ill-suppressed  delight  as  they  saw  the  gentlemen  of  the  South 
hoeing  their  gardens,  ploughing  the  fields,  driving  their  own 
ox  carts,  or  hiring  themselves  to  some  neighbor  that  could 
manage  to  give  them  three  meals  a  day  and  a  few  dollars  a 
month  to  work  as  laborers.  The  freedmen  crowded  to  the 
towns  and  cities.  Freedom  they  thought  meant  eternal  rest. 
Wonderful  stories  came  to  them  of  bounteous  stores  from 
the  boundless  treasury  in  Washington ;  and  visions  of  forty 
acres  and  a  mule;  or,  grander  yet,  of  rioving  into  the  "big 
house"  of  their  bankrupt  masters,  where  they  might  smoke 
their  pipes  in  the  library  of  the  "effete  aristocrats,"  lie  on 
old  Marster's  feather  beds,  and  use  the  master's  silver. 

Agriculture  was  totally  demoralized,  factories  generally 
destroyed,  railroads  worn  out  and  useless,  farming  imple- 
ments gone,  neither  ox  nor  mule  nor  horse  left  to  plough 
with;  fences  had  been  burnt  by  the  armies;  many  houses 


THE  SOUTH  SINCE  THE  WAR  269 

were  totally  dismantled,  the  whole  land  lying  under  the  curse 
of  Nineveh. 

Having  made  a  heroic  fight,  the  South  determined  to  ac- 
cept heroically  the  arbitrament  of  war.  Slavery  she  will- 
ingly surrendered ;  secession  as  a  remedy  for  grievances,  she 
embalmed  among  the  mummies  of  Egypt ;  the  right  of  a  state 
to  judge  of  infractions  of  the  constitution,  she  marked  "ob- 
solete," and  laid  on  the  shelf  with  Lilly's  Latin  grammar. 
She  threw  herself  on  the  mercy  of  her  conquerors. 

The  Southern  people  were  willing  and  anxious  to  settle 
down  and  begin  life  over  again.  They  were  willing  to  ac- 
cept any  fair  government  that  would  protect  their  persons, 
and  the  little  property  the  war  had  left  them;  believed  that 
Mr.  Lincoln  would  treat  them  humanely  if  not  kindly;  and 
were  ready  to  bear  anything  to  which  self-respecting  men 
could  submit. 

Mr.  Lincoln  had  already  shown  that  his  plan  of  restoring 
the  Union  was  not  one  of  cruelty.  On  December  8,  1863, 
he  had  offered  "full  pardon"  to  all  persons  (except  the 
leaders  of  the  "rebellion")  that  would  lay  down  their  arms, 
swear  allegiance  to  the  constitution,  and  promise  to  obey  all 
acts  of  Congress  that  had  been  passed  up  to  the  date  of  his 
amnesty  proclamation  (December  8,  1863).  He  further 
said  that,  if  one-tenth  of  the  votes  of  1860  in  any  seceded 
state  should  establish  a  government  upon  the  basis  outlined 
above,  he  would  recognize  it  as  "the  true  government  of  the 
State."  Representation  in  Congress,  he  said,  did  not  rest 
with  him,  but  with  Congress.  No  mention  was  made  of 
negro  suffrage.  Indeed,  we  have  it  on  record  that  Mr. 


270  HALF-HOURS    IN    SOUTHERN    HISTORY 

Lincoln  did  not  believe  that  the  negro  should  be  a  voter  or 
a  juror,  or  be  put  upon  any  political  or  social  equality  with 
the  white  man. 

When  the  war  closed,  Mr.  Lincoln  said,  "Let  'em  up  easy, 
let  'em  up  easy."  When  the  question  was  raised  whether 
to  regard  the  Southern  states  as  never  out  of  the  Union  but 
as  having  temporarily  cut  themselves  off  as  aliens,  Mr.  Lin- 
coln brushed  it  aside  as  not  a  practical  question,  but  as  rather 
what  is  called  "academic,"  that  is,  technical  and  not  worthy 
of  serious  discussion  at  such  a  crisis.  His  idea  was  to  bring 
the  seceded  states  into  practical  touch  with  the  other  states 
and  restore  them  as  soon  as  possible  to  their  place  in  the 
Union,  on  condition  that  they  surrender  slavery  and  the 
right  of  secession  and  accept  the  constitution  of  the  United 
States  as  the  fundamental  law  of  the  land.  His  method  was 
one  of  conciliation  and  of  restoration.  When  violent  men 
wished  to  treat  the  states  as  conquered  provinces  that  had 
forfeited  all  the  rights  of  statehood,  he  said,  "We  shall 
sooner  have  the  fowl  by  hatching  the  egg  than  by  smashing 
it." 

Ill 

The  Hounds  of  Peace 

This  policy  did  not  please  Congress.  A  large  number  in 
both  houses  thought  that  Mr.  Lincoln  was  too  lenient,  and 
that  he  was  violating  "the  rights  of  humanity"  and  "the 
principles  of  republican  government."  Chaos  reigned  su- 
preme. Many  were  so  angry  with  the  South  that  they  could 
not  hear  the  voice  of  mercy,  which  "droppeth  as  the  gentle 


THE  SOUTH  SINCE  THE  WAR  271 

dew  from  heaven."  Shy  lock  was  whetting  his  knife,  not  on 
his  sole  but  on  his  soul,  demanding  his  pound  of  flesh  from 
Antonio,  whose  argosies  had  gone  to  the  bottom  of  the 
ocean.  Mr.  Lincoln  was  firm  and  inflexible,  and,  on  April 
n,  1865,  said  publicly  that  he  still  clung  to  his  plan  of 
restoration. 

To  add  fuel  to  the  flame,  came  the  assassination  of  Presi- 
dent Lincoln.  None  deplored  this  wild  act  more  than  the 
South  and  her  noble  ex-president.  It  now  seems  incredible 
that  Andrew  Johnson,  the  successor  of  Mr.  Lincoln,  offered 
a  reward  of  $100,000  for  the  capture  of  Mr.  Davis  as  an 
accomplice  of  the  assassin.  Nor  was  the  South  in  any  sense 
responsible.  John  Wilkes  Booth  was  not  strictly  a  Southern 
man,  did  not  represent  the  South,  but  killed  the  president 
on  his  own  motion,  and  probably  from  personal  motives. 

While  deploring  the  assassination  and  regretting  that  Mr. 
Lincoln  did  not  live  to  carry  out  his  policy,  the  South  has 
never  professed  to  love  Mr.  Lincoln.  To  do  so  would  be 
arrant  hypocrisy.  She  cannot  put  him  along  with  Wash- 
ington, and  rank  him  with  the  demigods.  She  cannot  for- 
get his  campaign  cry  of  1858;  his  leading  a  ticket  avowedly 
hostile  to  her  institutions ;  his  saying  that  he  had  no  author- 
ity to  interfere  with  slavery,  and  yet  issuing  the  Emancipa- 
tion Proclamation ;  and  his  straining  and  rending  the  consti- 
tution that  he  promised  in  his  oath  of  office  faithfully  to 
maintain.  She,  however,  admires  his  great  ability,  his 
shrewd  common  sense,  his  keen  sagacity,  and  believes  that  he 
had  more  of  "the  milk  of  human  kindness,"  less  small  bitter- 
ness, less  desire  to  gloat  over  a  fallen  foe,  than  Andrew 
Johnson,  or  than  the  Radical  majority  in  Congress. 


272  HALF-HOURS    IN    SOUTHERN    HISTORY 

The  poet  tells  us  of  fearful  creatures  that,  "never  ceasing, 
barked  with  wide  Cerberean  mouths  full  loud,  and  rang  a 
hideous  peal."  Not  to  push  the  comparison  to  the  very 
farthest,  we  may  say  that  such  a  chorus  broke  upon  the  ears 
of  the  prostrate  South  after  Lincoln's  assassination.  Many 
believed  that  Booth  was  her  appointed  agent.  Many  accused 
Jefferson  Davis  of  being  an  accomplice,  and,  as  said  already, 
President  Johnson  offered  $100,000  reward  for  his  arrest; 
and  smaller  amounts  were  offered  for  other  Southern  gen- 
tlemen equally  above  such  atrocious  crimes  as  assassination. 
Thank  Heaven  that  such  charges  found  little  credence  even 
in  those  fearful  days !  We  regret  that  history  has  to  notice 
ihem  in  this  better  era ;  but  the  historian  more  than  the  poet 
must  deal  with  "the  unrelenting  past,"  enter  its  most  ghastly 
precincts,  and  walk  with  shuddering  horror  among  its  grin- 
ning sepulchres. 

We  have  all  heard  of  "the  dogs  of  war" ;  but  the  South 
suffered  more  from  the  hounds  of  peace. 

IV 

The  Reign  of  Terror 

With  the  accession  of  Andrew  Johnson  to  the  presidency, 
the  South  had  new  visions  of  horror.  Harsh  measures  were 
in  the  air.  The  imprisonment  of  Jefferson  Davis  and  of 
others  already  mentioned,  the  summons  issued  against  Gen- 
eral Lee  by  the  United  States  court  at  Norfolk,  and  the 
violent  language  used  by  the  new  president — all  these  things 


THE  SOUTH  SINCE  THE  WAR  273 

alarmed  those  that  had  figured  prominently  in  the  war ;  and 
a  number  of  them  left  the  United  States,  and  went,  some  to 
Cuba,  some  to  Egypt,  some  to  Mexico,  and  some  to  Europe. 

The  Radical  party  in  Congress  thought  that  providence 
had  come  to  their  assistance.  Now  should  the  conquered 
South  lick  the  dust  at  the  feet  of  her  enemies.  Soon  their 
faces  fell.  The  president's  tone  changed;  he  became  less 
bitter ;  it  was  soon  found  out  that  he  would  not  hang,  draw 
and  quarter  all  the  Confederate  leaders,  but  that  "my  policy" 
would  be  more  human  and  humane  than  he  first  intended. 
This  change  is  generally  attributed  to  the  influence  of  Mr. 
Seward,  secretary  of  state,  who  is  said  to  have  urged  Mr. 
Johnson  to  pursue  milder  methods. 

If  Congress  was  dissatisfied  with  Mr.  Lincoln's  leniency, 
they  raved  at  Mr.  Johnson's  mildness.  Then  began  the 
deadlock  between  the  legislative  and  the  executive  branches 
of  the  government  which  culminated  in  the  unsuccessful  im- 
peachment and  trial  of  the  president.  There  was  a  roaring 
chaos  of  opinions.  No  two  men  in  Congress  agreed  as  to 
how  the  South  should  be  got  back  into  the  Union ;  whether 
she  should  be  hung,  drawn,  and  quartered  first,  and  then 
brought  back  in  a  million  coffins ;  or  brought  back  first,  then 
tied  to  a  post,  whipped  till  the  blood  flowed  in  streams,  and 
then  carried  off  to  execution.  All  the  Radical  party  agreed 
that  the  president  had  nothing  to  do  with  it ;  that  he  was  not 
in  the  game  even  as  referee  or  umpire,  certainly  not  as 
captain.  Meantime  the  South  was  lying  in  "misery  and 
irons,  hard  by  at  death's  door."  Her  brave  sons  had  gone 
to  work ;  but  the  negroes  were  totally  demoralized,  and  little 
18 


274  HALF-HOURS   IN    SOUTHERN    HISTORY 

labor  could  be  had  to  work  the  crops.  Untold  thousands 
of  freedmen  threw  down  all  work,  flocked  to  the  towns, 
cities  and  camps,  expecting  to  be  supported  if  not  made  rich 
from  the  Federal  treasury. 

V 
The  Frecdman's  Bureau 

This  state  of  affairs,  Mr.  Lincoln  had  already  foreseen 
and  tried  to  provide  against.  Among  the  negroes  that  had 
followed  the  Federal  armies,  especially  Sherman's  army  in 
its  march  through  Georgia,  there  had  been  great  suffering 
and  destitution.  To  keep  these  runaways  from  starving, 
Congress,  on  March  3,  1865,  established  the  Freedman's 
Bureau,  but  did  not  make  any  adequate  appropriation;  so 
that  at  first  the  act  did  little  towards  relieving  want,  but 
a  great  deal  towards  making  the  negroes  feel  and  know  that 
they  were,  in  some  sense,  "the  wards  of  the  nation,"  and 
believe  that  the  Southern  people  were  their  worst  enemies. 

This  act,  with  amendments  and  "variations,"  was  in 
force  till  1872,  and  relieved  a  great  deal  of  suffering  among 
the  blacks,  and  among  whites  that  had  "stuck"  to  the  Union. 
It  also  established  schools,  colleges,  and  universities  for  the 
freedman,  and  spent  a  good  many  million  dollars  in  caring 
for  the  negro.  So  far  so  good.  The  abandoned  and  de- 
serted lands  which  this  Bureau  took  charge  of  to  give  the 
negroes,  was  the  property  of  the  wretched,  impoverished 
people  of  the  South,  and  much  of  it  was  recovered  by  the 
owners  only  after  great  delay  and  after  grievous  treatment 
at  the  hands  of  some  of  the  officials. 


THE  SOUTH  SINCE  THE  WAR  275 

Theoretically,  this  Bureau  sounds  very  noble.  As  de- 
scribed by  General  O.  O.  Howard,  the  commissioner  ap- 
pointed by  President  Johnson,  it  reads  like  an  extract  from 
the  writings  of  John  Howard,  Elizabeth  Fry,  or  some  other 
great  philanthropist.  Practically,  however,  it  did  not  work 
so  well.  To  disburse  all  these  millions  and  see  that  hun- 
dreds of  thousands  were  fed  daily  required  a  very  large 
corps  of  assistants ;  and  many  of  these  were  very  question- 
able characters.  All  this,  however,  might  have  gone  on 
without  adding  to  the  woes  of  the  South ;  and  we  must  refer 
brieflyto  the  reasons  why  the  name  Freedman's  Bureau  is 
unsavory  in  the  nostrils  of  the  Southern  people. 

One  of  its  clauses  made  its  agents  "guardians  of  freed- 
men,  with  power  to  settle  their  disputes  with  employers;" 
and  thereby  hangs  a  tale  ghastlier  than  any  that  ghost  or 
goblin  damned  ever  hissed  into  the  ear  of  Hamlet.  Under 
this  clause,  our  fathers  suffered  untold  annoyance,  indignity, 
and  insult.  Any  shiftless  negro  girl  could  threaten  her  em- 
ployer with  arrest  by  the  provost-marshal,  and  all  through 
the  South  cases  of  this  kind  were  of  daily  occurrence.  Our 
people  in  these  years  drank  the  cup  of  humiliation  to  its  very 
dregs,  the  "wine  of  astonishment"  to  its  very  bottom. 

VI 

The  Schoolmarm  in  Tradition 

At  this  time,  and  as  part  of  the  machinery  of  this  Bureau, 
appeared  "the  Yankee  schoolmarm,"  famous  in  Southern 
tradition.  Under  the  aegis  of  the  provost-marshal  and  his 


276  HALF-HOURS    IN    SOUTHERN    HISTORY 

assistants,  who  protected  her  from  the  imaginary  bullets  of 
the  imaginary  assassin  and  from  the  real  contempt  of  our 
mothers  and  grandmothers, 

In  her  noisy  mansion,  skilled  to  rule, 

The  village  schoolmarm  taught  her  little  school. 

Ladies  of  refinement  there  may  have  been  among  these 
teachers ;  but  many  of  them  came  for  what  they  could  make 
by  it.  We  shall  describe  "the  schoolmarm"  as  the  older 
people  generally  remember  her.  She  came  as  a  philanthro- 
pist, but  had  her  eyes  on  the  loaves  and  fishes.  She  told  the 
little  "darlings"  what  sacrifices  she  had  made  to  come  South 
to  raise  them  to  a  level  with  the  "proud  aristocrats  over  yon- 
der;" and,  at  the  end  of  the  session,  took  up  a  collection  in 
which  forks,  spoons,  and  family  heirlooms  figured  instead  of 
silver  dollars.  She  brought  a  stigma  upon  the  sacred  name 
of  teacher,  and  left  behind  her  the  flavor  of  asafoetida. 

The  last  interview  of  one  of  these  "marms"  with  old 
Aunt  Susan  is  interesting : 

"Good-bye,  Mrs.  Brown;  remember  now  what  I  say: 
You  are  as  good  as  any  of  these  white  people,  and  have  a 
perfect  right  to  eat  with  them  and  sit  in  the  parlor  with 
them.  Do  you  understand?" 

"Yes'm,"  replied  Aunt  Susan,  alias  Mrs.  Brown. 

"Now,  Mrs.  Brown,"  continued  the  retiring  head  of  Cross 
Roads  College,  "I  want  you  dear  people  to  know  what 
brought  me  down  here.  I  used  to  make  dresses  and  bonnets 
up  in  my  own  state,  but  came  South  to  help  elevate  your 
precious  children  to  equality  with  the  proud  aristocracy  of 
the  South.  Understand?" 


THE  SOUTH  SINCE  THE  WAR  277 

"Yes'm,"  said  Aunt  Susan;  "lemme  see.  Does  you  say 
I  is  good  as  my  ole  mistis?" 

"Oh,  yes,  certainly,"  answered  the  philanthropist. 

"An'  you  sez  yo'  biz'ness  at  home  wuz  to  make  dresses 
and  bonnits?" 

"Yes,"  answered  the  schoolmarm. 

"Well,  my  white  folks  never  'sochiates  wid  dressmakers 
and  millners,  an'  I  ain't  gwine  do  it;  good  mornin',  marm." 
(Exit  Mrs.  Brown,  usually  known  as  Aunt  Susan.) 

This  illustration  is  taken  from  an  article  published  by  a 
Southern  lady  in  1885,  after  the  heat  of  passion  had  sub- 
sided. It  represents  exactly  the  schoolmarm  in  tradition. 

VII 

Reconstruction  Through  Destruction 

President  Johnson  soon  showed  that  he  thought  the  presi- 
dent was  "in  the  saddle."  He  proposed  to  carry  on  the 
policy  of  "restoration" — what  is  called  in  our  history  presi- 
dential reconstruction;  but  Congress  violently  opposed  his 
policy.  Most  of  the  seceded  states  accepted  the  new  presi- 
dent's suggestions,  called  conventions,  adopted  constitutions, 
repealed  their  ordinances  of  secession,  accepted  the  thir- 
teenth amendment  abolishing  slavery  forever,  and  elected 
representatives  and  senators  to  seats  in  Congress.  Here 
came  the  rub.  When  these  representatives  and  senators  got 
to  Washington,  they  met  with  a  cold  reception  from  the 
Northern  members,  and  found  that  their  names  were  not  on 
the  roll  of  Congress.  The  clause  of  the  constitution  making 


278  HALF-HOURS    IN    SOUTHERN    HISTORY 

each  branch  of  Congress  the  judge  of  the  eligibility  of  its 
members  was  used  as  a  pretext  to  reject  these  Southern  rep- 
resentatives and  senators. 

Then  began  the  contest  between  Congress  and  the  presi- 
dent. February  26,  1866,  Congress  appointed  a  committee 
of  fifteen,  twelve  Republicans  and  three  Democrats,  to  look 
into  Southern  affairs.  On  June  18,  this  committee  reported 
against  the  president's  policy,  treated  the  South  as  still  in  a 
state  of  rebellion,  and,  under  the  leadership  of  violent  South- 
haters,  entered  upon  a  new  era  of  persecution. 

Meantime,  the  prostrate  South  was  fast  in  the  grip  of  the 
Freedman's  Bureau,  the  shiftless  freedman  himself,  and  the 
schoolmarm,  and  could  not  be  reinstated  in  the  Union.  Her 
great  offenses — what  led  Congress  to  denounce  her  as  still 
in  rebellion — were  first,  that  she  had  passed  laws  against 
vagrancy ;  but  this  had  been  done  to  protect  property  from 
millions  of  idlers,  mostly  of  the  freedman  class;  and,  second, 
that  she  was  unwilling  to  receive  the  slaves  as  political 
equals,  competent  to  vote  and  to  hold  public  office.  These 
bitter  pills  she  could  not  swallow  in  a  moment.  After  a 
while,  however,  she  submitted  to  the  inevitable,  and,  in  order 
to  get  some  kind  of  government  and  go  to  work  to  rebuild 
her  shattered  fortunes,  accepted  the  fourteenth  and  fifteenth 
amendments  to  the  constitution.  These  two  amendments, 
with  the  thirteenth  abolishing  slavery,  are  the  constitutional 
results  of  the  War  between  the  States,  alias  the  "Rebellion/' 

The  thirteenlh  amendment  confirmed  the  Emancipation 
Proclamation.  No  one  wishes  to  see  it  repealed. 

The  fourteenth  amendment  brought  a  new  being  into  ex- 


THE  SOUTH  SINCE  THE  WAR  279 

istence,  that  is,  a  citizen  of  the  United  States.  Before  its 
adoption,  men  were  citizens  of  their  respective  states,  and  in- 
cidentally residents  of  the  United  States.  Its  object  of 
course  was  to  make  citizens  of  the  negroes  emancipated  by 
the  war. 

The  fifteenth  amendment  went  farther,  and  gave  votes  to 
all  negro  males  over  21  years  of  age.  For  thirty  years  or 
more,  these  votes  were  cast  almost  solidly  in  the  interests  of 
one  political  party,  and  the  Southern  people  saw  that  there 
was  no  probability  that  the  negro  vote  would  ever  be  divided 
between  the  parties.  This  led  to  the  restriction  of  the 
suffrage  in  several  Southern  states.  The  results  are  ex- 
cellent. As  said  elsewhere,  a  good  many  whites  are  dis- 
franchised by  the  new  constitutions  of  the  Southern  states. 
The  best  class  of  colored  men  retain  their  votes,  and  the  mass 
of  idle  and  vicious  ones  are  disfranchised.  In  these  re- 
sults, the  North  has  practically  acquiesced,  and  the  Supreme 
Court  of  the  United  States  has  shown  no  inclination  to  up- 
set the  new  constitutions.  All  this  is  a  happy  omen.  It  is 
one  of  the  most  significant  signs  that  "the  war  is  at  last 
over." 

March  2,  1867,  is  the  "Black  Friday"  of  the  South.  On 
that  day,  Congress  passed,  over  the  president's  veto,  a  bill 
dividing  the  territory  of  secession,  except  Tennessee,  into 
five  military  districts,  to  be  commanded  by  generals  of  the 
United  States  army.  These  military  governors  were  or- 
dered to  ignore  the  state  governments  and  the  state  officers 
as  illegal  and  as  insufficient  to  protect  the  freedman  in  his 
rights  under  the  constitution.  Under  this  act,  the  mass  of 


280  HALF-HOURS   IN   SOUTHERN   HISTORY 

intelligent  white  men  in  the  South  were  disfranchised,  and 
all  negro  males  over  twenty-one  were  given  the  ballot  The 
results  may  be  imagined. 

VIII 

The  Carpetbagger  and  the  Scalawag 

In  the  midst  of  this  hurlyburly  of  wrack  and  ruin,  and  as 
a  part  of  the  diabolical  machinery,  appears  that  monstrosity, 
that  vulture  of  society,  the  "carpetbagger."  He  is  the  pro  • 
duct  of  putrefaction,  the  child  of  carrion  and  decay.  In  our 
day,  he  packs  his  bag  and  speeds  to  the  sister  isle  of  Cuba, 
and  his  odor  is  even  now  borne  to  us  on  the  southern  zephyr. 
When  the  Philippines  are  "pacified,"  he  will  take  ship  to 
"loot"  the  treasury  of  that  territory. 

The  carpetbagger  of  1865  was  tne  lowest  of  his  ilk,  the 
basest  of  his  species.  Often  he  was  an  apostate  in  religion, 
a  preacher  driven  out  of  some  community  for  political  cor- 
ruption, for  immorality,  or  for  robbing  his  church's  treasury. 
He  refugeed  to  the  prostrate  South  to  recoup  his  fortunes 
by  plundering  bankrupt  commonwealths. 

To  inflame  the  negroes  against  their  former  masters;  to 
speak  contemptuously  of  the  "poor  white  rebel  trash;"  to 
point  the  negro  to  the  home  of  "that  broken-down  aristo- 
crat" and  ask  him  how  he  would  like  to  have  it;  to  ogle 
him  and  embrace  him,  calling  him  "Mister"  and  "Brother," 
and  count  upon  his  vote  at  the  next  election, — such  was  the 
employment  of  this  bird  of  prey,  this  cross  between  the 
cormorant  and  the  buzzard. 


THE  SOUTH  SINCE  THE  WAR  281 

Forth  from  this  cesspool  of  corruption,  sprang  another 
creature  forever  infamous  as  the  "scalawag."  He  is  a  rene- 
gade Southerner,  who  joined  the  carpetbagger  and  the 
negro  in  dividing  offices,  plundering  citizens,  and  robbing 
the  public  treasury.  Before  the  war,  he  was  a  blatant  "day- 
before-yesterday  secessionist."  During  the  war,  he  prob- 
ably held  a  bomb-proof  position  far  from  the  post  of  danger. 
When  Congress  quarrelled  with  the  president,  he  saw  the 
opportunity  of  his  life,  sneaked  slimily  out  of  his  hole,  and 
with  oily  tongue  ingratiated  himself  with  the  august  repre- 
sentatives of  the  conqueror,  while  gleams  of  the  guberna- 
torial mansion  and  of  senatorial  honors  flashed  before  his 
snaky  vision. 

The  carpetbagger  is  no  new  character  in  history.  He 
has  lived  in  all  periods  and  among  all  nations.  He  crossed 
the  Mediterranean,  and  checked  his  carpetbag  for  Utica  and 
Magnesia.  He  was  with  the  infamous  Verres,  whom 
Cicero  denounced  for  plundering  Sicily.  He  crossed  the 
Channel  with  William  the  Norman,  and  battened  on  the 
decaying  carcass  of  Anglo-Saxon  civilization.  History  re- 
peats itself. 

Scalawags,  also,  were  produced  in  earlier  ages;  but  ours 
seem  fouler.  Sicily,  Africa,  and  Asia  Minor  had  them  in 
abundance ;  but  those  were  pagan  days,  and  men  were  sunk 
in  superstition  and  brutality.  England  under  the  Con- 
queror had  them  in  plenty ;  but  that  was  before  the  days  of 
nice  honor  and  chivalric  ideals.  The  scalawag  of  1865,  we 
repeat,  was  "the  basest  of  his  species." 


282  HALF-HOURS   IN    SOUTHERN   HISTORY 

IX 

The  Third  Triumvirate 

When  Caesar,  Crassus,  and  Pompey  divided  the  Roman 
world  among  them,  they  were  indulging  "that  vaulting  am- 
bition which  o'erleaps  itself,"  but  were  themselves  the  worst 
sufferers.  When  Octavius,  Antony,  and  Lepidus  drew  up 
their  deadly  proscription,  they  were  but  following  the  prec- 
edents of  a  pagan  age;  but  their  deeds,  though  bloody  and 
heinous,  did  not  undermine  the  civilization  of  the  Roman 
world.  Not  so  with  the  third  triumvirate,  composed  of  the 
carpetbagger,  the  scalawag,  and  the  negro.  They  rode 
roughshod  over  private  rights,  piled  up  huge  debts  for  pos- 
terity, plundered  the  public  treasury,  and  made  heinous  plots 
against  the  hearth  and  home  of  the  Southern  family. 

We  must  say,  however,  that  the  poor  ignorant  freedman 
was  but  a  pliant  tool  in  the  hands  of  unprincipled  men  of  the 
other  two  classes.  Rascality  and  robbery  ran  riot.  Enor- 
mous debts  were  piled  up  against  the  states ;  the  bonds  were 
sold  cheap  to  adventurers  from  every  section;  and  colossal 
fortunes  were  made  by  depraved  and  corrupt  men  like  Le- 
gree,  famous  in  ante-bellum  fiction.  The  debt  of  Alabama 
increased  from  about  six  million  to  about  thirty-eight  mil- 
lion; that  of  Florida  from  two  hundred  and  twenty-one 
thousand  to  nearly  sixteen  million ;  that  of  South  Carolina 
from  five  million  to  thirty-nine  million;  and  the  debts  of 
other  states  in  about  the  same  proportion.  The  debts  of 
the  eleven  seceding  states  were  increased  from  eighty-sever 


THE  SOUTH  SINCE  TEE  WAR  283 

million  to  three  hundred  and  eighty  million.*  A  former 
congressman  from  Maine  says  that  the  military  government 
of  South  Carolina  in  1867  was  "a  carnival  of  crime  and 
corruption,"  "a  morass  of  rottenness,"  "a  huge  system  of 
brigandage."  Justice  L.  Q.  C.  Lamar  says  that  the  recon- 
struction policy  of  Congress  was  intended  to  reverse  every 
natural,  social,  and  political  relation  on  which  the  civiliza- 
tion not  only  of  the  South,  but  of  the  whole  Union  rested. 

The  black  man  was  stirred  up  against  the  white  man  by 
incendiary  speeches  in  public  and  by  the  basest  suggestions 
in  private.  To  get  the  "proud  aristocrat's"  house  and  home 
was  held  up  as  immediately  possible ;  to  get  his  daughter  in 
marriage  was  to  follow.  Compared  with  the  last  sugges- 
tion, all  others  sank  into  insignificance.  To  stand  by  dis- 
franchised and  see  great  masses  of  ignorant  and  insolent 
men  of  an  inferior  race  casting  their  votes  against  one's 
property,  and  laying  up  boundless  debts  and  burdens  for 
posterity — this  was  bad,  yet  for  a  time  endurable;  but  the 
attack  upon  the  home,  upon  the  racial  integrity  of  the  Anglo- 
Saxon — this  would  make  every  Southern  father  draw  the 
sword  of  Virginius,  and  smile  with  joy  that  he  yet  lived  to 
thrust  it  into  the  vitals  of  his  daughter. 

Behind  all  this  reign  of  atrocity,  stood  the  Radical  ma- 
jority in  Congress.  In  this  era  of  better  feeling,  it  is  al- 
most incredible  that  men  of  Anglo-Saxon  blood  could  have 
given  countenance  to  plans  of  reconstruction  that  could  lead 
to  such  results.  In  their  fury,  they  impeached  President 
Johnson  because  his  plan  seemed  too  lenient;  possibly  they 


*Dr.  J.  L.  M.  Curry's  figure*. 


284  HALF-HOURS   IN   SOUTHERN   HISTORY 

would  have  impeached  even  Abraham  Lincoln,  had  he  lived 
to  urge  his  temperate  and  humane  policy. 

A  quotation  from  the  records  of  that  period  will  interest 
the  student.  Let  us  see  what  Mr.  D.  H.  Chamberlain,  of 
Massachusetts, ,  attorney-general  of  South  Carolina  from 
1868  to  1872,  writes  of  the  situation.  First,  as  to  the  "un- 
wise and  unfortunate"  conduct  of  the  white  men  of  that 
noble  old  commonwealth,  sprung  from  the  best  blood  of  the 
French  Huguenot  and  of  the  Anglo-Saxon.  Says  Mr. 
Chamberlain:  "One  race  (that  is,  the  whites)  stood  aloft 
and  haughtily  refused  to  seek  the  confidence  of  the  race 
which  was  just  entering  on  its  new  powers."  Shades  of 
Alfred  and  of  Washington !  Men  of  the  great  Anglo-Saxon 
race  expected  to  "seek  the  confidence,"  to  acknowledge  the 
leadership,  of  a  race  known  to  history  only  as  "hewers  of 
wood  and  drawers  of  water"  through  all  the  ages ! 

So  much  for  Mr.  Chamberlain's  knowledge  of  history. 
Now  for  his  opinion  of  the  carpetbagger  and  the  scalawag. 
"Three  years  have  passed,"  says  he,  "and  the  result  is — 
what?  Incompetency,  dishonesty,  corruption  in  all  its 
forms,  have  'advanced  their  miscreated  fronts/  have  put 
to  flight  the  small  remnant  that  opposed  them,  and  now 
rules  the  party  that  rules  the  State."  Mr.  Chamberlain's 
candor  and  truthfulness  compel  our  admiration,  in  spite  of 
his  monstrous  twaddle  about  the  Anglo-Saxons  of  Carolina. 


THE  SOUTH  SINCE  THE  WAR  285 

X 

The  K«  Klux  Klan 

This  state  of  affairs  could  not  last ;  moderate  wickedness 
might  have  lasted  longer.  Respectable  Northern  men  living 
in  the  South  revolted  against  it,  and  began  to  think  about 
their  Anglo-Saxon  civilization.  As  a  result,  there  sprang  up 
the  Ku  Klux  Klan,*  a  secret  order  instituted  by  the  whites 
in  self-preservation,  but  later  on  used  for  unworthy  pur- 
poses,, Great  throngs  of  men  clothed  in  white  sheets  rode 
single  file  on  horseback  through  negro  sections  of  the  coun- 
try; their  horses  drank  water  by  the  barrel,  and  the  riders, 
by  the  bucketful;  skulls  and  crossbones  were  drawn  on  the 
doors  and  walls,  and  on  all  the  voting  places :  the  appeal  to 
superstition  won  the  victory;  the  great  reign  of  terror  was 
over. 

It  was  anarchy;  but  self-preservation  is  the  first  law  of 
nature.  Let  him  that  is  without  sin  among  us  throw  the 
first  stone,  we  say  reverently.  The  nation  that  holds  the 
continent  bought  from  the  Indian  with  beads  and  bracelets, 
or  taken  from  him  at  the  point  of  the  bayonet,  the  nation 
that  gave  Spain  twenty  million  dollars  for  a  principality,  can 
ill  afford — whether  North  or  South — to  blame  the  Anglo- 
Saxon  for  using  ghosts  and  goblins  to  save  his  property 
and  maintain  his  civilization. 

This  fearful  period  may  be  said  to  have  lasted  from  1865 
to  1876.  During  these  years,  many  of  the  young  men  went 
to  new  states  to  seek  their  fortunes;  capital  shrank  from 
the  South  as  men  shrink  from  a  leper;  two-thirds  of 

*In  Thomas  Dlxon's  play,  The  Clansman,  Gen.  N.  B.  Forreet  ia  represented  as  b«lng 
the  grand  commander  of  the  Ku  Klux  Klan. 


286  HALF-HOURS    IN    SOUTHERN    HISTORY 

the  wealth  of  the  South  had  been  swept  away ;  money,  if  any 
one  would  lend  it,  was  held  at  the  fabulous  rate  of  75  per 
cent  or  80  per  cent ;  colossal  ruin  reigned  supreme. 

Even  President  Grant,  so  kindly  in  some  ways,  had  kept 
soldiers  in  the  South  to  terrorize  elections.  Hayes  re- 
lieved the  South  of  this  incubus.  From  his  accession  to  the 
presidency,  the  new  era  of  reconstruction  set  in — recon- 
struction by  the  Southern  people,  the  only  kind  that  could 
be  sound  or  permanent. 

Of  the  "black-and-tan"  conventions  that  drafted  the  new 
constitutions,  we  have  already  briefly  spoken.  Virginia's 
great  ( !)  convention  was  probably  more  decent,  or  less  bar- 
barous, than  some  others;  that  worthy  body  drafted  the  con- 
stitution under  which  Virginia  lived  till  July  10,  1902.  A 
handful  of  Virginia  gentlemen  of  brains  and  character  were 
powerless  against  the  enormous  black-and-tan  majority  in 
the  "famous"  Underwood  convention.  An  anecdote  of  two 
of  the  statesmen  will  lighten  up  our  ghastly  narrative.  The 
question  of  issuing  certain  stock  and  bonds  was  being  dis- 
cussed by  the  carpetbaggers  and  the  scalawags,  when  one 
ebony  statesman  turned  to  another  and  said,  "What  is  dis 
yere  storck  de  is  talkin'  about  so  much?  Whar's  de  gwine 
ter  put  all  dat  storck  ?"  "Oh,  shur !  Jim,  ain't  you  done  lis- 
ten to  de  'schusion?  De  storck  is  gwine  ter  be  kep  in  de 
barns."  Both  solons  were  ready  to  vote;  carpetbagger  and 
scalawag  were  ready  to  divide  the  office  and  the  plunder. 


THE  SOUTH  SINCE  THE  WAR  287 

XI 

Reconstruction  by  the  Southern  People 
The  real  restoration  of  the  South  may  be  said  to  have 
begun  about  1880.  In  that  year,  she  had  about  17^  per  cent 
of  "the  assessed  property  of  the  whole  country,  against  44 
per  cent  in  1860.  By  1890,  she  had  added  $3,800,000,000 
to  her  assessed  values,  a  gain  of  more  than  50  per  cent 
in  ten  years.  In  farm  products,  she  gained  16  per  cent  in 
the  same  period.  In  1896,  she  made  one-third  of  the  corn 
crop  of  the  country;  she  now  makes  more  than  half  the 
total  wheat  crop.  In  the  period  1880-1895,  she  increased 
her  cotton  crop  from  five  million  to  almost  ten  million 
bales.  In  1894,  she  manufactured  718,515  bales;  in  1903, 
2,000,729  bales.  In  1903,  her  cotton  crop  was  nearly  eleven 
million  bales;  in  1904,  more  than  ten  million;  in  1905, 
nearly  fourteen  million;  and  in  1906,  it  was  more  than 
eleven  million  bales. 

In  the  ante-bellum  period,  the  South  grew  rich  on  grains, 
sugar,  rice,  indigo,  and  tobacco.  Now  she  has  all  these 
sources  of  wealth,  and  many  others.  Since  1863,  the  wheat 
shipments  of  New  Orleans  have  increased  from  2,744,581 
bushels  to  15,643,745  bushels  a  year,  and  the  corn  shipments 
from  less  than  1,000,000  bushels  to  12,832,139  bushels. 
The  shipments  from  Galveston  have  increased  in  the  same 
proportion.  In  1902,  the  shipments  from  these  two  ports 
together  almost  equalled  those  from  New  York.  Cotton 
mills  are  springing  up  in  all  directions.  New  England  mills, 
also,  are  moving  south,  so  as  to  save  freights,  and  thus  be 
able  to  compete  better  with  Southern  mills.  In  1902,  for 


288  HALF-HOURS   IN   SOUTHERN   HISTORY 

the  first  time,  the  number  of  bales  and  pounds  used  by 
Southern  mills  exceeded  those  of  the  North  and  East. 

Before  the  war,  the  seed  of  the  cotton  was  fed  to  the  hogs. 
To-day,  it  is  used  for  fertilizing  after  a  valuable  oil  has  been 
extracted.  The  income  from  this  new  source  of  wealth  in- 
creased almost  ten-fold  in  fifteen  years. 

The  South  is  developing  vast  mines  of  coal  and  of  iron. 
In  fifteen  years,  the  output  of  coal  from  her  mines  increased 
fivefold.  She  is  "sending  iron  to  Pennsylvania  and  coal  to 
Newcastle,"  says  a  distinguished  educator.*  By  putting 
iron  ore,  coke,  coal,  and  limestone  close  together,  nature 
enables  the  South  to  undersell  the  world  in  manufactured 
iron. 

The  railroads  of  the  South  are  developing  rapidly.  Since 
1894,  the  Southern  Railway  has  increased  in  mileage  from 
4,159  to  7,550;  the  Louisville  and  Nashville,  from  2,673  to 
4,279;  the  Norfolk  and  Western,  from  1,327  to  1,861.  In 
the  same  period,  the  united  earnings  of  these  three  systems 
have  more  than  doubled. 

Cotton  will  yet  be  "king."  By  building  mills  near  the 
cotton  fields,  the  South  can  soon  dictate  the  price  of  cotton 
to  the  world.  The  proposed  canal  across  Central  America, 
by  bringing  the  Southern  states  much  closer  to  China,  will 
greatly  promote  the  cotton  interests  of  the  South,  and  in 
various  ways  add  to  the  wealth  of  the  whole  nation. 

In  farm  produce,  in  garden  products,  in  foreign  com- 
merce, in  banking,  and  in  many  other  sources  of  wealth,  the 
South  is  making  substantial  progress  in  building  up  her 


*ChancellorJ.  H.  Kirkland,  of  Vanderbilt  University. 


N.  B.  FORREST 


THE  SOUTH  SINCE  THE  WAR  289 

waste  places  and  restoring  her  shattered  fortunes.  She  is 
no  longer  dependent  upon  negro  labor,  though  she  prefers 
the  negro  for  her  rice,  her  sugar,  and  her  cotton  fields.  Her 
farmers  are  rapidly  learning  to  diversify  their  crops  so  as 
to  be  less  injured  by  the  decline  in  this  or  that  market.  The 
brains  and  the  energy  formerly  devoted  to  politics  will  soon 
make  the  South  wealthy,  and  make  her  educational  institu- 
tions equal  to  those  of  any  other  section  in  training  intelli- 
gent citizens. 

In  educational  matters,  also,  the  South  has  made  most 
substantial  progress.  A  Northern  expert  says  that)  the 
South  is  spending  as  much  on  public  education  as  Great 
Britain,  though  the  population  is  little  more  than  half.  The 
magnanimity  of  the  Southern  people  in  giving  negro  child- 
ren the  same  advantages  as  their  own,  in  spite  of  the  fact 
that  the  whites  pay  over  90  per  cent  of  the  taxes,  is  one  of 
the  greatest  proofs  of  the  true  nobility  of  our  people.  The 
South  has  forgiven  the  poor  hoodwinked  freedman,  but  de- 
spises the  white  men  that  used  him  as  a  cat's-paw. 

The  colleges  and  the  state  universities  of  the  South  are 
doing  a  great  work  in  training  the  youth  of  both  sexes, 
proving  that  our  people  believe  in  an  intelligent  citizenship. 
It  is  said  that  no  Southern  college  was  extinguished  by  the 
war,  but  that  the  people,  by  private  and  by  state  funds,  have 
revived  all  that  were  closed  or  seriously  crippled  by  war  and 
its  results.  In  the  twenty  years  from  1875  to  1895,  school 
attendance  increased  130  per  cent,  while  population  in- 
creased only  54  per  cent ;  the  value  of  school  property  more 
than  trebled;  the  attendance  upon  the  colleges  and  univer- 
sities increased  in  fifteen  years  150  per  cent. 
19 


290  HALF-HOURS    IN    SOUTHERN    HISTORY 

To  the  buoyancy  and  the  hopefulness  of  our  people,  we 
have  referred  in  foregoing  pages.  The  power  of  recuper- 
ation, with  peoples  as  with  individuals,  is  one  of  the  sweet- 
est gifts  of  Heaven;  and  this  gift  in  large  measure  has  been 
bestowed  upon  our  people.  The  French  people,  also,  have 
wonderful  recuperative  power,  but  the  South  has  eclipsed 
that  nation.  After  the  Franco-Prussian  War  ( 1870-1871 ) , 
France  lay  apparently  prostrate  and  helpless  at  the  feet  of 
the  new  German  Confederation.  It  seemed  as  if  all  were 
lost  including  honor ;  and  a  superficial  observer  might  have 
thought  that  France  might  never  resume  her  place  among 
the  "great  powers  of  Europe."  Such  gloomy  fears  were 
soon  dissipated.  In  a  short  time,  France  paid  a  war  in- 
demnity of  over  a  billion  dollars,  and,  in  spite  of  the  loss  of 
valuable  territory  ceded  to  the  conqueror,  soon  resumed  her 
place  among  the  great  nations  of  Europe.  Even  greater 
power  of  recuperation  has  been  shown  by  our  noble  people. 
Though  one-third  of  her  able-bodied  men  had  died  from 
the  effects  of  war;  though  she  had  lost  two-thirds  of  her 
assessed  property  by  the  forcible  confiscation  of  her  slaves, 
by  plunder,  and  by  the  legitimate  results  of  failure ;  though 
the  era  of  reconstruction  had  paralyzed  her  energies  and 
made  life  a  mere  existence — yet,  since  her  people  regained 
control  of  their  local  governments,  the  South  has  rallied  be- 
yond expression,  and  now  her  pulses  throb  with  the  fullness 
of  the  spring  and  with  the  buoyancy  of  a  new  vitality. 

The  war  was  worth  all  it  cost.  It  has  made  labor  more 
universal.  Before  the  war,  a  good  many  young  men  lived 
on  their  fathers  and  helped  languidly  to  manage  the  planta- 


THE  SOUTH  SINCE  THE  WAR  291 

tion.  Now  every  young  man  is  expected  to  adopt  a  trade, 
a  business,  or  a  profession,  and  the  first  question  asked  of 
a  young  man  of  twenty-five  is,  "What  is  your  business  or 
profession?"  Gentlemen  of  easy  leisure  are  little  respected. 
Labor  is  more  honored  than  ever  before. 

Being  cut  off  from  political  honors  and  preferment,  the 
brains  of  the  South  have  been  devoted  to  other  matters. 
Politics  used  to  be  the  bane  of  her  civilization;  to  every 
statesman,  she  had  a  thousand  small  politicians.  Now  our 
people  are  as  a  rule  too  busy  to  go  into  politics,  and  it  is 
very  hard  to  induce  good  business  men,  or  men  of  standing 
in  the  professions,  to  take  public  office.  Consequently,  we 
are  producing  great  leaders  of  industry,  great  financiers, 
fine  lawyers,  noble  educators,  and  excellent  scholars.  States- 
men we  can  hardly  hope  to  produce  while  occupying  our 
isolated  position,  politically,  in  the  Union.  A  Clay  or  a 
Calhoun  from  the  South  could  not  muster  a  majority  in  the 
Senate. 

XII 

The  Race  Problem 

The  "negro  question"  is  one  of  the  great  problems  now 
awaiting  solution.  Not  whether  the  negro  shall  sit  at  the 
white  man's  table,  smoke  in  his  library,  and  marry  his 
daughter — that  question  is  never  discussed  south  of  the 
Potomac ;  but  whether  he  shall  take  part  in  the  government 
of  the  Southern  people,  and  hold  public  office  and  other  po- 
sitions of  honor  and  responsibility.  This  race  question  is 


292  HALF-HOURS   IN    SOUTHERN   HISTORY 

one  that  vitally  concerns  the  individual  states,  and  must  be 
left  to  them  for  solution.  If  many  negroes  are  disfran- 
chised by  the  new  constitutions  of  North  Carolina,  Virginia, 
Louisiana,  Alabama,  and  other  Southern  states,  it  is  because 
they  cannot  meet  the  requirements  as  to  intelligence  and  as 
to  amount  of  property  laid  down  by  those  constitutions. 
That  no  man  can  be  deprived  of  his  vote  on  account  of  race, 
color,  or  previous  condition  of  servitude  is  known  to  every- 
one who  has  ever  heard  of  the  war  amendments  to  the  con- 
stitution of  the  United  States,  or  who  ever  reads  a  news- 
paper. A  good  many  whites  lose  their  votes  under  the  new 
constitutions  of  the  South,  but  vastly  more  negroes  are  dis- 
franchised. It  is  needless  to  say  that  the  South  believes 
that  this  is  a  white  man's  country;  and  it  would  seem  that 
the  North  is  rapidly  coming  to  the  same  opinion. 

This  race  question  has  been  a  bone  of  contention  ever 
since  the  formation  of  our  government.  In  1787,  it  came 
near  defeating  the  plan  for  a  "more  perfect  union ;"  and  the 
so-called  "Federal  ratio,"  whereby  five  slaves  were  counted 
as  three  citizens  in  fixing  the  number  of  representatives  in 
Congress,  was  resorted  to  as  a  compromise.  Then  came  the 
long  wrangle  as  to  "free  states"  and  "slave  states;"  the 
Missouri  compromise  of  1820;  the  angry  debates  in  Con- 
gress; the  rise  of  the  Abolition  party;  the  publication  of 
Uncle  Tom's  Cabin;  John  Brown's  raid,  and,  to  cap  the 
climax,  the  great  war  outlined  in  foregoing  chapters.  Worse 
than  all  that,  came  the  era  of  reconstruction,  when  a  merci- 
less Radical  majority  in  Congress  attempted  to  put  the 
freedman  in  control  of  millions  of  what  an  English  his- 
torian has  called  the  flower  of  the  Anglo-Saxon  race.  This 


THE  SOUTH  SINCE  THE  WAR  293 

problem  long  refused  to  admit  of  solution.  White  men  in 
the  South  used  this  negro  vote  to  elevate  themselves  into  pub- 
lic office,  until  the  South  was  driven  to  the  conclusion  that 
the  negro  must  get  out  of  politics  and  let  the  white  man 
govern  both  races  unassisted.  This  is  the  true  solution. 
Since  retiring  largely  from  the  field  of  statesmanship,  the 
negro  is  less  objectionable  to  his  Anglo-Saxon  neighbor; 
and,  if  the  United  States  government  and  its  courts  will  let 
the  South  alone  and  not  interfere  in  her  suffrage  questions, 
we  shall  have  peace,  happiness,  and  fraternal  union. 

As  said  before,  the  negro  question  has  long  been  the 
apple  of  discord  between  the  sections  of  our  country.  How 
preposterous  it  seems  for  brethren  of  the  great  Anglo-Saxon 
race  to  quarrel  over  a  race  so  manifestly  inferior,  and  so 
clearly  intended  by  providence  to  occupy  a  position  of  in- 
feriority !  It  simply  proves  the  perversity  and  the  stupidity 
of  human  nature. 

As  said  in  an  earlier  chapter,  many  of  the  ablest  men  of 
the  ante-bellum  period  were  in  favor  of  colonizing  the  ne- 
groes in  Africa.  Some  of  the  thoughtful  men  of  our  day 
are  in  favor  of  deportation.  At  present,  however,  the  cotton 
states  are  opposed  to  the  separation  of  the  races.  They  be- 
lieve that  the  labor  of  the  negro  is  indispensable  on  the  rice 
and  cotton  plantations;  but  the  time  may  come  soon  when 
this  idea  will  vanish  before  statistics. 

Rudimentary  education  the  Southern  people  intend  to 
give  the  negro  if  he  stays  cut  of  politics;  but,  if  his  so- 
called  friends  in  other  sections  should  upset  the  suffrage 
laws  now  prevailing  in  the  South,  the  next  step  would 


294  HALF-HOURS    IN    SOUTHERN    HISTORY 

probably  be  to  let  the  colored  children  have  no  schools  ex- 
cept those  that  could  be  maintained  by  the  taxes  of  the  col- 
ored people  alone.  This  would  give  them  one  school  where 
they  now  have  ten.  At  present,  comparatively  few  Southern 
whites  favor  a  division  of  the  school  tax  on  the  basis  of 
color;  if,  however,  the  United  States  courts  should  inter- 
fere with  suffrage  laws  in  the  South,  there  would  be  a  tidal 
wave  of  indignation  that  would  submerge  the  colored 
schools  sustained  by  the  whites,  and  produce  other  results 
too  painful  to  predict. 

Bad  advice  and  pernicious  leadership  have  injured  the 
colored  man  beyond  expression.  Alienated  from  his  white 
neighbors,  first  by  scalawags  and  carpetbaggers,  more  re- 
cently by  artful  politicians,  he  has  left  the  white  man's 
church,  protested  against  white  teachers,  and  lost  the  train- 
ing that  contact  with  a  higher  civilization  used  to  give  him. 
The  difference  between  the  old  colored  people  and  the 
younger  is  very  noticeable,  and  to  this  deterioration  is  due 
the  present  state  of  feeling  between  the  races.  The  only 
solution  of  the  problem,  if  the  colored  man  is  to  remain  in 
the  South,  is  for  him  to  get  out  of  the  white  man's  way, 
politically  and  otherwise :  competition  will  inevitably  destroy 
him.  His  only  place  in  the  South  is  that  of  a  servant  with- 
out servitude. 

At  school  and  at  church,  also,  he  is  often  wofully  misled, 
even  totally  ruined.  Many  of  his  teachers  set  him  against 
his  white  neighbors.  Instead  of  reminding  him  that  the 
schoolhouse  was  built  with  the  white  man's  money  and  the 
teacher's  salary  paid  out  of  the  white  man's  treasury,  the 
teacher  too  often  plants  the  seeds  of  race  bitterness  in  the 


THE  SOUTH  SINCE  THE  WAR  295 

black  child's  bosom.  At  home,  too,  a  great  many  parents 
are  doing  the  same  thing,  thus  sowing  the  wind  to  reap  the 
whirlwind  in  the  future.  We  are  glad  to  say,  however, 
that  there  are  some  wiser  teachers  and  some  wiser  colored 
parents.  A  most  respectable  colored  teacher  in  Virginia, 
on  being  asked  quite  recently  why  his  pupils  were  so  of- 
fensive to  white  citizens  on  the  streets,  replied,  "I  try  to 
teach  them  right  at  school,  but  they  are  taught  wrong  at 
home." 

At  church,  also,  they  get  some  pernicious  instruction, 
though  we  rejoice  to  say  that  there  are  a  number  of  faithful 
colored  ministers  trying  to  lift  their  people  to  a  higher 
moral  level.  To  illustrate  our  statement  as  to  pernicious 
instruction,  we  cite  an  incident  related  to  us  by  a  Virginia 
gentleman  of  high  Christian  character.  His  family  had 
but  one  servant,  a  colored  woman,  whom  they  trusted  as  a 
member  of  the  family  and  for  whom  they  all  felt  a  deep 
affection.  Handkerchiefs,  pieces  of  jewelry,  and  other 
things  disappeared  mysteriously;  but  at  first  no  one  sus- 
pected the  servant.  Finally,  the  losses  became  so  heavy 
that  they  were  compelled  to  suspect  her,  as  she  was  the  only 
person  that  had  access  to  the  trunks  and  bureaus.  One  day 
they  searched  her  trunk,  and  in  it  found  the  missing  articles. 
They  called  her  up,  told  her  how  they  had  felt  towards  her 
and  how  they  had  trusted  her,  and  asked  her  why  she  had 
betrayed  their  confidence.  She  replied  :  "Well,  my  preacher 
tells  us  that  the  Lord  told  the  Jews,  when  they  went  out  of 
Egypt  to  plunder  the  Egyptians,  to  get  even  with  them  for 
keeping  them  in  bondage ;  and  he  says  that  we  have  a  right 


296  HALF-HOURS   IN    SOUTHERN   HISTORY 

to  get  all  we  can  out  of  the  white  people  for  having  kept  us 
in  slavery." 

Shakespeare  makes  one  of  his  characters  say  that  the 
devil  can  cite  scripture  for  his  purpose.  So  with  this  negro 
preacher.  He  might  be  pardoned  for  not  understanding  the 
command  given  by  Moses  to  the  Jews  in  verse  22  of  the  3rd 
chapter  of  Exodus;  but  the  application  of  it  to  the  colored 
race  is  a  clear  perversion  of  scripture.  How  shall  the  blind 
lead  the  blind? 

A  strong  feeling  for  employing  white  teachers  for  negro 
children  is  developing  in  parts  of  the  South.  There  are 
many  ladies  in  the  Southern  states  who  would  take  charge 
of  schools  for  colored  children,  and  thus  guarantee  them 
several  hours  a  day  of  good  moral  teaching  and  moral  in- 
fluence. 

What  the  negro  needs  is  kind  but  firm  restraint  such  as  he 
had  in  slavery.  He  is  the  child-race  of  the  world.  In- 
stead of  letting  him  live  in  idleness,  or  work  only  one  day 
in  six,  as  numbers  of  them  do,  many  are  in  favor  of  putting 
him  under  tutelage,  and  compelling  him  to  earn  honest 
wages.  If  his  hands  and  his  brain  were  employed,  his  evil 
propensities  would  be  to  a  large  degree  curbed,  and  thus 
the  most  potent  cause  of  bad  feeling  between  the  races 
would  be  removed,  partially  if  not  entirely. 

He  needs,  also,  good  leaders  of  his  own  race.  Most  of 
his  representative  men,  when  they  meet,  pass  resolutions 
against  lynching,  but  rarely  condemn  the  monstrous  crimes 
that  drive  the  white  man  to  such  frenzy. 


THE  SOUTH  QINCE  THE  WAR  297 

XIII 

Morals  and  Religion 

In  morals  and  religion,  the  Southern  people  are  still  quite 
sound  at  bottom.  Divorce,  though  more  common  than  be- 
fore the  war,  still  puts  one  on  the  defensive,  if  not  under  a 
social  stigma. 

Immorality  is  condemned;  drunkards  are  despised;  the 
temperance  movement  is  sweeping  large  parts  of  the  coun- 
try, the  elimination  of  the  vicious  vote  giving  the  temper- 
ance cause  a  wonderful  impetus,  even  in  such  conservative 
states  as  Virginia.  The  negro  vote  always  went  in  the 
main  on  the  side  of  liquor;  and  in  temperance  elections  the 
colored  preacher  could  not  control  his  members. 

To  decline  a  drink  used  to  cause  duels.  Now,  duelling  is 
put  among  the  antiquities,  and  liquor  is  rarely  offered  in 
private  houses. 

In  religious  matters,  the  Southern  people  are  still  very 
conservative.  New  fads  and  isms  find  little  favor  among 
them.  To  go  to  church  at  least  once  on  Sunday  is  expected 
of  every  good  citizen,  and  a  public  violation  of  the  Sabbath 
injures  a  man's  standing  in  most  communities.  The  two 
races  no  longer  worship  together.  The  colored  race  de- 
mand their  own  churches,  and  preachers  of  their  own  color. 
Many  of  the  preachers  were  used  by  the  white  politicians, 
and  lost  caste  with  their  white  neighbors ;  but  some  of  them 
have  been  very  useful  in  maintaining  law  and  order. 

The  people  of  the  so-called  "New  South"  still  honor  re- 
ligion, respect  the  Sabbath,  and  despise  cant  and  hypocrisy. 


298  HALF-HOURS   IN   SOUTHERN   HIBTOR7 

Social  swearing,  if  we  may  coin  the  phrase,  is  no  longer 
"good  form"  in  the  South.  An  oath  uttered  audibly  in  the 
Westmoreland  Club  of  Richmond  would  cause  amazement; 
swearing  is  relegated  to  the  barroom  and  other  haunts  of 
the  sons  of  Belial.  Gentlemen  of  standing  rarely  swear  in 
public;  but  most  youths  have  a  touch  of  the  habit  just  after 
measles  and  roseola. 

Lynching  is  just  now  bringing  censure  upon  some  South- 
ern communities;  but  it  is  an  erroneous  idea  that  it  is  con- 
fined to  the  South  or  that  negroes  are  the  only  victims.  It 
is  true,  however,  that  about  three-fourths  of  the  lynchings 
occur  in  the  South,  and  that  over  half  of  the  victims  are  ne- 
groes. It  is  equally  true  that  the  principal  cause  of  lynching 
is  the  freedman's  crime;  and  it  may  be  added  that,  as 
long  as  this  cause  continues,  lynching  will  be  resorted  to. 
Southern  men  will  not  allow  certain  facts  to  be  dragged 
through  the  courts,  while  police-court  lawyers  delight  po- 
lice-court rabbles  with  their  indecent  questions.  We  regret 
to  say,  moreover,  that  the  colored  people  as  a  rule  do  not 
condemn  the  crimes  leading  to  lynching  half  as  vigorously 
as  they  do  the  lynching.  The  colored  man  does  not  seem 
to  have  the  least  conception  of  the  awful  sanctity  of  the 
white  man's  home:  the  chasm  at  this  point  is  as  wide  as 
eternity. 

As  some  of  the  brutal  element  of  the  negro  race  move 
north  and  west,  these  sections  are  resorting  to  lynch  law 
almost  daily.  The  people  there  are  beginning  to  sympathize 
with  the  South  considerably.  Foreigners,  however,  do  not 
understand  the  awful  situation.  Says  an  Englishman  living 


THE  SOUTH  SINCE  THE  WAR  299 

in  Mississippi :  "It  is  perfectly  useless  to  try  to  explain  to  a 

foreigner  the  true  inwardness  of  lynch  law 

I  do  not  uphold  them  in  wrong-doing,  and  yet  I  tell  my 
English  kinsmen  and  friends  that,  if  they  were  surrounded 
by  the  same  conditions,  they  would  undoubtedly  act  just  as 
the  Southerners  do.  Human  nature,  especially  Anglo- 
Saxon  nature,  is  the  same  in  all  lands." 

In  the  matter  of  honor,  we  still  have  much  to  be  proud  of. 
We  cannot  claim,  however,  that  we  are  as  strictly  scrupulous 
as  the  .generations  before  us.  Civil  wars  always  affect  the 
honor  and  the  morals  of  a  people,  and  we  cannot  claim  total 
exemption  from  this  law  of  nature.  While  our  election 
officers  have,  in  many  cases,  used  very  questionable  methods 
to  maintain  the  political  supremacy  of  the  white  race,  our 
people  as  a  mass  regret  tha<  such  methods  were  considered 
necessary,  and  are  recasting  their  constitutions  so  as  to 
eliminate  the  vicious  and  purchasable  vote  by  fair  and  hon- 
orable means.  Upon  the  youth  of  our  day  devolves  the 
responsibility  of  carrying  out  hereafter  the  election  laws 
created  under  these  new  state  constitutions.  The  tempta- 
tion to  corrupt  methods  will  exist  no  longer.  Cheating  in 
elections  will  train  our  people  to  cheat  in  other  matters. 
The  habit  of  dishonesty  and  prevarication  grows  into  a 
second  nature. 

Though  making  the  concessions  in  the  last  paragraph,  we 
can  still  say  that  we  have  not  been  "sinners  above  all  the 
Galileans." 

The  young  men  of  the  South  are  still  sound  in  the  es- 
sentials of  honor.  The  college  honor  spoken  of  in  our 


300  HALF-HOURS    IN    SOUTHERN    HISTORY 

second  chapter  is  still  maintained  to  a  degree  that  augurs 
well  for  the  future.  While  cheating  on  examinations  is 
more  frequent  than  "before  the  war,"  it  is  generally  con- 
demned by  the  public  sentiment  of  the  students,  and  the 
student  body  will  often  secure  the  necessary  evidence  and 
present  the  culprit  before  the  faculty  for  trial.  Northern 
colleges  and  universities  have  been  trying  recently  to  intro- 
duce the  honor  system :  prominent  students  sometimes  write 
south  to  inquire  as  to  its  details,  and  its  methods  of  opera- 
tion. 

Municipal  corruption  figures  a  good  deal  in  our  daily 
papers.  Councilmen  are  bought  up ;  some  are  convicted  of 
bribery,  and  others  go  unpunished.  In  this  matter,  also,  we 
are  not  "sinners  above  all  the  Galileans."  Some  of  the 
pious  and  self-righteous  cities  of  the  other  sections  are 
worse  than  those  of  the  old  "slave-driver"  and  "lashing 
planter."  Two  wrongs,  however,  do  not  make  a  right.  We 
must  make  our  town  councils  and  our  legislatures,  like 
Caesar's  wife,  above  reproach.  It  devolves  upon  us  to  elect 
men  of  character  to  these  positions.  If  such  men  say  that 
they  are  too  busy  to  accept  office,  our  boys  must  determine, 
first  to  be  men  of  character,  and  then  to  make  some  personal 
sacrifice  in  order  to  serve  the  city  and  the  commonwealth. 
We  still  have  much  to  be  thankful  for.  In  these  cases  of 
municipal  corruption,  the  men  under  suspicion  rarely  repre- 
sent the  real  civilization  of  our  communities.  They  are 
generally  men  of  little  previous  standing,  itching  for  public 
office,  and  using  it,  when  gained,  for  their  own  personal  ends 
and  objects. 


THE  SOUTH  SINCE  THE  WAR  301 

Our  educated  men  are  generally  men  of  honor.  The 
teachers  and  the  scholars  of  the  South  are  as  a  rule  highly 
respected  as  representing  the  best  type  of  the  citizen  and  of 
the  gentleman.  Few  of  them  can  be  bought  at  any  figure. 
A  few  Southern  states  have  been  accused  of  rottenness  and 
corruption  in  the  matter  of  "book  adoptions;"  but  the  men 
suspected  of  selling  their  votes*  are  generally  not  educators 
and  scholars,  but  men  of  the  type  described  in  the  foregoing 
paragraph  pushing  their  way  into  school  boards  and  state 
boards  of  education.  We  must  mark  these  men,  and  by  our 
votes  bury  them  in  the  obscurity  from  which  they  sprang. 

XIV 

Zaccheus*  is  Coming  Down 

Love  for  the  Union  is  increasing  in  the  South.  Though 
she  is  practically  ignored  in  the  national  government,  and 
though  many  objectionable' men  represent  the  Federal  gov- 
ernment in  Southern  communities,  the  South  is  proud  of  the 
Union,  would  fight  for  it  against  any  foreign  nation,  and 
welcomes  overtures  from  friendly  Northerners  like  Mr. 
Charles  Francis  Adams  and  others  that  are  leading  the  way 
to  full  reconciliation.  The  young  men  love  the  Union  more 
than  the  older;  but  state  loyalty  is  still  very  strong  among 
all  classes.  If  compelled  to  choose  between  the  State  and 
the  Union,  the  men  of  the  South  would  undoubtedly  "go 
with  the  state ;"  but  the  possibility  of  a  rupture  is  never  dis- 
cussed with  any  seriousness.  The  right  of  secession, 

*S«e  page  122. 


302  HALF-HOURS    IN    SOUTHERN    HISTORY 

"though  not  by  gunpowder  determinable,"  is  not  regarded 
as  a  live  question,  but  rather  as  what  editors  call  "dead 
matter."  It  would  take  a  number  of  wild-cat  presidents 
and  pestiferous  politicians  to  resurrect  the  doctrine  of  se- 
cession as  a  burning  question. 

A  Southern  youth,  if  asked  which  he  loves  most,  the  state 
or  the  Union,  would  probably  say,  "I  love  not  Caesar  less 
but  Rome  more,"  Caesar  being  the  Union,  and  Rome  his  na- 
tive state.  Possibly  we  should  say  he  loves  the  Union  well, 
and  his  state  better. 

President  Cleveland's  official  recognition  of  Southern  men 
did  no  little  to  cement  the  sections.  In  his  cabinet,  sat 
several  Southern  men  of  high  standing;  and,  during  the 
great  naval  review  in  1893,  when  the  fleets  of  the  world 
met  our  navy  in  Hampton  Roads,  a  Confederate  veteran, 
who  was  secretary  of  war,  was  welcomed  to  the  harbor  by 
the  screaming  of  hundreds  of  whistles,  American  and 
foreign. 

President  McKinley  was  respected,  if  not  loved,  by  the 
Southern  people.  His  tragic  death  was  greatly  deplored  by 
our  people,  and  public  sentiment  in  the  South  demanded  the 
execution  of  the  assassin. 

In  the  war  with  Spain  in  1898,  the  South  showed  great 
loyalty  to  the  Union.  The  greatest  diplomat  of  that  era 
was  Fitzhugh  Lee,  consul-general  to  Havana.  This  noble 
son  of  Virginia  was  selected  for  this  position  when  the  re- 
lations between  Spain  and  the  United  States  were  becoming 
"strained"  on  account  of  our  sympathy  with  Cuba.  General 
Lee  was  a  brilliant  success,  and  helped  to  distinguish  Mr. 


THE  SOUTH  SINCE  THE  WAR  303 

McKinley's  administration.  The  president,  it  is  thought, 
permitted  small  politicians  to  "sidetrack"  this  eminent 
Southerner  and  Democrat  in  the  slashes  of  Florida,  instead 
of  sending  him  as  the  liberator  of  Cuba. 

In  the  war  with  Spain,  Worth  Bagley,  of  North  Carolina, 
was  the  first  man  killed  in  battle.  The  heroic  deed  of  Hob- 
son,  of  Alabama,  in  attempting  to  block  up  the  harbor  of 
Santiago ;  the  bravery  of  "Little  Joe  Wheeler"  in  the  same 
campaign;  the  gallantry  of  Schley,  the  noble  son  of  Mary- 
land— all  helped  to  unite  the  different  sections  of  our 
country. 

If  we  may  judge  by  the  signs  of  the  times,  the  day  of  true 
union  and  full  reconciliation  is  fast  approaching.  Mr. 
Charles  Francis  Adams's  Charleston  address,  in  which  he 
said  that  both  sides  were  right  in  1861 ;  Mr.  Cleveland's 
Madison  Square  Garden  speech,  in  which  he  praised  the 
magnanimity  of  the  South  towards  the  negro,  and  urged  the 
North  to  leave  the  solution  of  the  negro  problem  to  the 
Southern  people;  the  endorsement  of  that  speech  by  the 
Philadelphia  Press,  long  the  exponent  of  the  warmest  anti- 
Southern  sentiment;  the  addresses  made  in  Richmond,  Va., 
in  April,  1903,  by  Mr.  St.  Clair  McKelway,  editor  of  the 
Brooklyn  Eagle,  and  by  Dr.  Lyman  Abbott,  in  which  they 
spoke  tenderly  of  Southern  heroes  and  sympathetically  on 
Southern  questions — these  and  other  significant  events  have 
made  the  heart  of  the  South  beat  faster,  and  prepared  the 
way  for  a  union  not  "pinned  together  by  bayonets,"  but 
"resting  upon  the  consent  of  the  governed." 

Mutual  forgiveness  and  reparation!     This,  as  already 


304  HALF-HOURS   IN   SOUTHERN   HISTORY 

said,  is  the  open  sesame  to  fraternal  union  and  to  the  full 
measure  of  our  national  greatness.  If  such  Northern  men 
as  those  named  above  could  write  our  histories,  compile  our 
encyclopedias,  and  edit  all  our  great  journals,  this  book 
might  not  be  needed,  or  certainly  many  of  its  paragraphs 
might  be  dispensed  with.  Alas!  however,  ink-pots  of 
Liliput  and  pygmy  politicians  have  so  shaped  public  senti- 
ment, so  filled  our  bookshelves  with  pestilential  libels,  that, 
unless  Southern  men  write  the  truth,  the  South  will  be 
handed  down  to  infamy.  Books  are  still  pouring  from  the 
press,  encyclopedias  still  being  printed,  that  demand  refu- 
tation from  Southern  writers. 

We  are  not  waving  the  "bloody  shirt,"  but  telling  the 
truth,  "naught  extenuating  and  naught  setting  down  in 
malice."  Truth  is  the  great  healer.  Truth  crushed  to  earth 
will  rise  again.  To  tell  the  truth  to  the  people  of  the 
South,  and  to  all  elsewhere  that  care  to  know  it, — such  is  the 
object  of  this  volume,  and  we  invoke  upon  it  the  blessing  of 
high  Heaven,  that  it  may  increase  the  self-respect  of  our  be- 
loved South,  disabuse  some  fair  minds  in  other  sections  of 
false  ideas  as  to  her  history,  her  customs,  her  institutions, 
and  her  motives,  past  and  present,  and  hasten  the  day  when 
"Ephraim  shall  not  envy  Judah  and  Judah  shall  not  vex 
Ephraim." 


CONCLUSION  305 


CHAPTER  X 
CONCLUSION 

I 
Recapitulation 

WE  have  finished  our  talks.  Before  parting,  let  us 
take  time  for  a  few  words  of  review,  of  recapitu- 
lation, and  a  few  words  by  way  of  warning  to  the 
young  reader  of  these  pages. 

We  have  tried  to  show  the  Southern  youth  how  much  he 
has  to  love  and  to  be  proud  of,  and  how  much  there  is  to 
inspire  him.  In  our  earlier  talks,  we  dwelt  upon  some  of 
the  poetic  features  of  our  country,  and  tried  to  appeal  to  the 
sentiment  for  the  venerable,  the  lofty,  in  our  history.  We 
stood  together  at  Roanoke  Island,  Saint  Augustine,  and 
Jamestown,  and  gave  ourselves  up  to  the  thoughts  too  deep 
for  utterance  that  surge  in  upon  our  souls  as  we  stand  at 
such  sacred  places.  Then  we  took  up  the  heroic  phases  of 
the  colonial  era.  We  saw  how  our  Southern  fathers  rose 
up  against  the  tyranny  of  Harvey  and  of  Berkeley,  and  left 
us  as  a  legacy  eternal  hatred  of  tyranny  and  of  tyrants. 

Coming  to  the  last  half  of  the  i8th  century,  we  saw  the 

men  of  the  South  cooperating  with  those  of  Massachusetts 

in  opposing  the  tyranny  of  George  III  and  his  ministers. 

Along  with  Otis  of  Massachusetts,  we  named  Henry,  the 

20 


306  HALF-HOURS    IN    SOUTHERN    HISTORY 

Virginian,  whom  both  tradition  and  history  have  made  pre- 
eminent. In  the  war  that  the  colonies  waged  for  independ- 
ence, the  South,  we  saw,  played  a  noble  part.  We  passed 
rapidly  in  review  the  career  of  some  of  her  greatest  soldiers, 
spoke  briefly  of  some  of  the  critical  battles  of  the  Revolu- 
tion, and  saw  clearly  that  the  South  played  a  noble  and 
heroic  part  in  achieving  American  independence. 

Then  came  the  era  of  constitutions.  The  South's  part  in 
drafting  the  Federal  constitution  of  1787,  we  found  to  be 
very  great;  and  we  saw  later  on  that  the  violation  of  this 
great  compact  or  agreement  by  many  Northern  and  West- 
ern states  led  eleven  Southern  states  to  secede  from  the 
Union  in  1861. 

Between  the  formation  of  the  Union  (1789)  and  its  dis- 
solution (1861),  came,  it  will  be  remembered,  the  War  of 
1812  and  the  Mexican  War  (1846).  That  our  states  did 
nobly  in  these  wars,  we  showed  very  clearly.  We  then  re- 
viewed the  cause  of  ill-feeling  between  the  sections.  We 
showed  that  the  South  bore  patiently  for  many  years  the 
attacks  made  by  fanatics  upon  her  people  and  her  institu- 
tions, bore  slurs  and  abuse  from  many  quarters,  bore  the 
nullification  on  the  part  of  many  Northern  and  Western 
states  of  clauses  of  the  constitution  and  of  acts  of  Congress 
in  which  she  was  deeply  interested.  We  saw  that,  when,  in 
1860,  a  great  party  avowedly  hostile  to  her  and  her  inter- 
ests got  possession  of  the  government,  seven  Southern  states 
seceded,  and  that  four  others,  because  they  did  not  believe 
in  coercion,  joined  the  secession  movement. 

That  the  doctrine  of  secession  was  not  confined  to  the 


CONCLUSION  307 


South  but  was  also  a  New  England  doctrine,  we  proved  con- 
clusively; and  that  nullification,  also,  was  a  New  England 
doctrine,  we  showed  very  clearly. 

We  then  gave  a  rapid  sketch  of  the  great  war  for  South- 
ern independence.  We  discussed  the  rearing,  the  motives, 
the  courage,  and  the  self-sacrificing  heroism  of  the  soldiers 
and  the  sailors  of  the  Confederacy;  gave  a  rapid  outline  of 
the  campaigns  of  Lee,  Jackson,  and  Albert  Sidney  Johnston, 
and  of  the  sufferings  of  the  noble  women  of  the  South,  the 
wives  and  the  mothers  of  heroes. 

We"  wrote  as  a  Southern  man  for  Southern  youth. 
While  glorifying  the  South,  we  did  not  heap  maledictions 
and  denunciations  upon  every  one  in  the  North,  but  upon 
those  alone  that  came  under  the  head  of  fanatics,  vilifiers, 
marauders,  plunderers,  and  heroes  of  "triumphal"  marches 
over  women,  children,  and  graves.  Any  one  that  takes  of- 
fense must  either  belong  to  one  of  these  classes  or  condone 
the  crimes  referred  to.  "If  any,  speak,  for  him  have  I  of- 
fended." Hatred  towards  any  section,  we  have  not  en- 
couraged. Love  for  the  South,  admiration  for  her  heroes, 
belief  in  her  sincerity,  and  in  the  eternal  justice  of  her  cause 
— all  this  we  have  taught  to  the  best  of  our  ability  and  with 
all  the  earnestness  of  conviction.  "If  this  be  treason,  make 
the  most  of  it." 

II 

Patriotism 

What  we  all,  old  and  young,  need,  is  real  patriotism. 
We  need  a  larger  vision  of  our  relation  to  our  country. 


308  HALF-HOURS   IN   SOUTHERN   HISTORY 

Local  patriotism  killed  ancient  Greece,  and,  if  encouraged, 
may  kill  modern  America. 

In  ancient  Greece,  men  used  to  say,  "  I  am  an  Athenian," 
"I  am  a  Spartan,"  "I  am  a  Theban;"  and  the  system  of  city- 
states  indicated  by  these  phrases  led  Greece  to  disintegration, 
decay,  and  ruin. 

General  Henry  Lee  in  1798  needed  a  larger  vision  when 
he  cried  in  the  Virginia  legislature,  "Virginia  is  my  coun- 
try." John  Randolph,  of  Roanoke,  needed  it.  We  in  the 
twentieth  century  need  it  also.  Let  us  lift  up  our  eyes  unto 
the  hills  and  catch  the  inspiration. 

Patriotism  means  love  of  country,  love  of  one's  native 
land.  Some  men  spell  country  without  r\  but  even  West- 
moreland county  is  no  man's  country.  If  we  love  only 
Texas,  Georgia,  or  Virginia,  we  cannot  say  that  we  are 
patriotic.  We  must  love  our  country  as  a  whole.  We 
must  love  the  flag  that  has  braved  a  hundred  years  the  bat- 
tle and  the  breeze.  If  we  have  not  this  love,  we  are  orphans 
in  the  universe,  we  are  cut  off  from  one  of  the  deepest 
sources  of  joy.  A  man  without  patriotism  is  a  man  without 
a  country,  and  a  man  without  a  country  is  more  to  be  pitied 
than  the  man  without  a  shadow — the  famous  but  wretched 
being  of  German  literature. 

A  great  German  author  depicts  in  vivid  language  the  suf- 
ferings of  the  man  without  a  shadow ;  how  he  was  pursued 
by  the  sidelong  glances  of  every  passer-by  and  by  the  curious 
stare  of  vulgar  mobs,  and  so  driven  to  desperation.  Worse 
than  this  is  the  suffering  of  the  man  without  a  country. 
Better  migrate  to  the  bleak  hills  of  Labrador  and,  sitting  on 
the  shivering  edges  of  a  glacier,  cry,  "My  country  'tis  of 


CONCLUSION  309 


thee  I  sing,"  than  live  in  a  land  of  perpetual  sunshine  and 
of  golden  harvests,  with  lips  that  cannot  sing  that  thrilling 
anthem. 

Already  I  hear  your  comments,  "gentle"  reader.  The 
Northern  sympathizer  is  saying,  "Good;  he's  advising  the 
youth  of  the  South  to  forget  the  war  and  love  the  Union." 
The  overzealous  Southerner  is  saying,  "Bah !  he's  gone  over 
to  the  enemy,  and  is  catering  to  the  majority." 

Both  are  wrong,  especially  the  Southerner.  His  sneer 
is  as  false  as  Lucifer's  when  he  told  the  Almighty  that  Job 
knew  which  side  his  bread  was  buttered  on,  and  that  he 
served  God  for  the  loaves  and  fishes.  Wrong,  too,  was  the 
Northerner,  when  he  thought  that  this  writer  was  urging 
the  Southern  youth  to  "forget  the  war."  When  I  forget  the 
war,  let  my  tongue  cleave  to  the  roof  of  my  mouth,  and  let 
my  right  hand  forget  its  cunning. 

What,  then  ?  Both  are  wrong,  I  repeat.  I  am  just  where 
I  started :  we  need  a  larger  vision  of  patriotism. 

Virginia  is  not  your  country.  Carolina  is  not  your  coun- 
try. Alabama,  Florida,  Tennessee,  though  all  call  up  sweet 
and  solemn  memories,  are  not  your  country.  You  need 
what  the  Romans  call  patria  and  the  Germans  fatherland 
— and  would  that  we  had  the  word,  and  the  same  lofty  sen- 
timent that  thrills  the  bosom  of  the  German  as  he  sings, 
What  is  the  German's  Fatherland ? 

A  man  may  say  that  the  old  Abolition  party  destroyed  his 
love  for  this  country.  That  party  is  out  of  date,  but  the 
fatherland  still  lives.  Another  may  say  that  he  does  not 
love  the  flag  because  so  many  South-haters  have  sung  of 


310  HALF-HOURS   IN    SOUTHERN    HISTORY 

that  flag  in  verse  or  have  glorified  it  in  their  orations.  Rise 
to  a  larger  vision.  Do  you  hate  the  Bible  because  many 
blatant  and  pernicious  sects  have  quoted  it  as  authority  for 
their  perverted  teachings? 

We  can  denounce  the  abolitionists,  but  love  our  country. 
We  can  denounce  the  slurs  of  pestiferous  poets,  pulpiteers, 
and  orators,  but  still  love  the  flag  which  our  fathers  helped 
to  make  respected  and  feared  on  land  and  ocean.  It  is  our 
country,  our  flag.  Shall  we  let  these  men  and  their  modern 
imitators  scratch  our  names  out  of  the  old  family  Bible  and 
drive  us  out  of  the  halls  of  our  fathers,  and  leave  us  shiver- 
ing in  the  cold  without  a  home  where  we  may  meet  around 
the  old  hearth  and  the  old  Yule  log? 

For  forty  years,  this  Las  been  our  blunder ;  let  us  up  and 
rectify  it  Let  us  go  up  and  keep  the  feast.  If  some  of 
the  family  give  us  cold  looks  and  treat  us  as  the  prodigal  son 
who  has  wasted  his  substance  with  riotous  living,  let  us  not 
be  driven  from  the  ancestral  halls  and  the  graves  of  our 
fathers ;  but,  led  by  Virginia,  the  oldest  of  all  the  sisters,  and 
"Carolina  bright  and  fair,"  let  us  take  our  place  at  the  old 
fireside  and  sing  together  the  songs  of  "Auld  Lang  Syne." 


INDEX 


Abolition  Party:  rise  of,  ..  171.     Boston  Massacre:   37,    38 


Abolition  Societies   173 

Abbott,  Lyman:    303 

Adams,  Charles  Francis:   . . 

77,  84,  187,  301,  303 

Adams,  John  Quincy :  

150,  151,  184,  185,  187 

Alabama:   secedes;    193 

debt  of,  282 

Alamance:  battle  of, 40 

Alien  and  Sedition  Acts,  . . .  191 

Andros,  Governor:    30 

Antietam:  battle  of,  244 

Anti-Federalists   and    Feder- 
alists:    156,  158 

Appomattox:    surrender    at,  251 

Arkansas:  secedes, 193 

Articles    of    Confederation: 

80,     83 

Ashe,  John:  59 

Atlanta:  privations  in,  ....  232 
Aunt  Phillis'   Cabin:    101 

Bacon's  Rebellion:  28,  29 

Bagley,  Worth:    303 

Bee,  Barnard  E.:    254 

Berkeley,  Sir  William:   ..27,  30 

Biglow  Papers:    47 

"Black  Friday":    279 

"Book  Adoptions":    301 

Bopne,   Daniel:    71 

Booth,  John  Wilkes:   ...271,  272 


Boyd,  Belle:    218,219 

Brown,  John:    178,  179 

Buchanan,  James:    193 

Buell,  D.  C.:   200,  201 

Burgesses,  House  of:  ..163,  164 
Burnside,  A.  E.:  245,  246 

Calhoun,  John  C.:  156,  190,  191 
Campbell,  William:  ....  57,  58 
Carolina  and  Virginia:  ...36-44 

Carpetbagger:    280,  284 

Carrington,  Edward:    41 

Caswell,  Richard :  61 

Cavalier  and  Puritan:   

119,  123,  147,  149 

Cedar  Run,  Battle  of:   261 

Chamberlain,  D.  H.:   284 

Chancellorsville  and  Marye's 

Heights:     245,  247 

Christ  in  the  Camp:  ..207,  208 
Civilization,  the  Planter:  116-119 
Civil  War  (See  War  between 

the  States.) 

Clark,  George  Rogers:  58 

Clarke,  Elijah:  68 

Clay,  Henry:   86,175 

Cleveland,  Benjamin:    60 

Cleveland,  Grover:    302,  303 

Code  Duello:    127 

Cold  Harbor;  battle  of  ....  250 
Commercial,  Cincinnati:  ...  186 


[3111 


312 


HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 


Committees    of    Correspond- 
ence        40 

Committee  of  Safety:    43 

Common  Sense:  47 

Confederate  Candle:    219 

Confederate   States:    govern- 
ment organized,  193 

Confederate  Veteran:   195 

Confederacy,  Women  of  the 

213,  240 
Congress:  the  first  American    24 

of  1765,    35,     36 

continental,   

36,  49,    80 

Stamp  act,    35,    36 

representation 

fixed    81,     82 

secession   discuss- 
ed in,  183 

and  Lincoln,  270,  271 
and  Andrew  John- 
son,   ..273,  277,  278 
Constitution:   remarks  on,       20 
and  the  south 

78-86 
views  of  the 

150-158 
and    "higher 

law,"    172 

amendments 

to,    ...278,  279 
Constitutional      Convention 

of   1787:    79-82 

Conway,  Cabal:    59 

Cooke,  John  Esten:   25 

Cooke,  John  R.:    244,  245 

Cotton    Gin:    effect    of    the, 

171,  172 
Croghan,  George:    88 


Cross  Keys:  battle  of, 261 

Curry,  J.  L.  M.:    101,  109 

Davidson,  William:    61 

Davie,  William  R. :    60 

Davis,  Jefferson:  94,  153,  156, 
175,  189,  193,  194,  258,  266,  271, 
272. 

Declaration     of     Independ- 
ence :   passed,   49 

Declaration  of  Rights:   49 

Dixon,  Thomas:    285 

Dred  Scott  Case:  177 

Dunmore,  Lord:    ....30,46,    53 
Dwight,   Dr.   Timothy:    182,  184 

Eagle,  Brooklyn:   303 

Education  in  the  South:   .. 

107,  108,  289 
Emancipation:    In  Virginia, 

163,  170 
the      begin- 
ning of,  . .  166 
growth   of, 

169-172 
proc  1  a  m  a- 

tion,   271 

Embargo  Act:   189,  190 

Encyclopedia    Britan- 

nica:   101-103,  192,  229 

Estrangement:    early   cause 

of 146-158 

later  causes 

of,    ....158-162 
greatest 
cause      of, 

162-181 
Ewell,  Richard  S.:  243 

Faneuil  Hall:   .  38 


INDEX 


313 


Federalists:   and  anti-Feder- 
alists,   156-158 

Federal  Ratio:    168 

Female  College:  the  first  in 

America,    25 

Fifteenth  Amendment:  ...  279 
Fiske,  John:  24,  42,  71,  72, 

84,  148,  184,  185,  190 

Five  Resolutions:    34,    35 

Florida:  secedes, 193 

debt   of,    282 

Fort  Donelson:    263 

Fort  Henry:    263 

Forrest;  N.  B.:  ...240,  263,  285 
Fourteenth  Amendment:  . .  278 
Fredericksburg:  battle  of,  . .  245 

Freedman's  Bureau:    274 

Fremont,   John  C.: 177 

Frietchie,  Barbara:  213,  259,  260 
Fugitive  Slave  Laws:  ..173,  191 

Gadsden,  Christopher:    ..35,    46 

Gambling:    129 

Geiger,  Emily:    67,    68 

Gentlemen  of  the  Old  School :  144 
George  III  and  his  Friends: 

30-36 

Georgia:     first    female    col- 
lege in 25,  116 

and      independ- 
ence,         47 

heroes  of,    68-71 

in     the     Revolu- 
tion,       76 

in  convention  of 

1787 79 

in  Mexican  War,    95 
cedes    claims    to 
territory 167 


Georgia:       and      emancipa- 
tion  170 

secedes,   193 

"triumphal 
march"  through 

230-232 
Gettysburg:   battle  of,   ..247-249 

Gist,    Mordecai:    52 

Gordon,  John  B.:    251 

Grady,  Henry  W. :    116 

Grant,  U.  S.:   123,  230,  250, 

-    251,  266,  267 
Great  Bridge:  battle  of,  ...     53 

Greeley,   Horace:    186 

Greg,    Percy:     on    Mexican 

War,  96 

on    slavery, 

133,  134 

Habersham,  Colonel:   43 

Hatton,  Robert:    242 

Hamilton,  Alexander:    20 

Hampton,   Wade:      130,  242,  248 

Harnett,  Cornelius :    62 

Harrison,  William  Henry: .  .     87 

Hartford  Convention :    

184,  185,  188,  190 

Hart,  Nancy:  70,    71 

Harvey,  Sir  John:   27,    30 

Henry,  Patrick:    

33,  34,  41,  58,     81 
Herald,   New   York:    on   se- 
cession  186 

Heroes:  and  Heroines,  ...51-72 
of  the  frontier,  ..71-72 
homes  that  made, 

98-146 

Heroines  in  Homespun:  234-236 
"Higher  Law,  The":    ...173-174 


314 


HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 


Hill,  A.  P.:    246,  251 

Hoar,  George  F.:  77 

"Honor    System":    107,  108,  129 

Hooker,  Joseph:    246 

House  of  Burgesses:   36,    38 

Houston,  Sam:   88 

Howard,  John  Eager:    ..51,     55 
Hundred     Years     Wrangle, 

The:     146-196 

Hunter,  William :   61,    62 

Independence :    44-51 

Intolerable  Acts:   39 

Jackson,  Andrew:    87,    88 

Jackson,  James :    69 

Jackson,  T.  J. : 

94,  178,  240,  253,  261 

Jackson,  Mrs.  T.  J. :   255 

Jamestown:    22,    23 

Jamestown  Exposition:  129 

Jasper,  William:    69,    70 

Jefferson,  Thomas:   

84,  85.  156,  158 
Johnson,  Andrew: 

271-274,  277,  278 
Johnson,  Richard  M.:  ...87,  88 
Johnston,  Albert  Sidney: 

189,  240,  241,  247,  262,  265 
Johnston,  Joseph  E.: 

94,  189,  230,  232,  240,  266 

Kansas:    and    slavery   ques- 
tion,      176 

Kentucky:  and  Dan'l  Boone,  71 
in  Mexican  War,  193 
stays  in  Union,  193 

Kernstown:  battle  of, 260 

Ku  Klux  Klan:   285,  286 


Latane1,  William:    243 

Lee,  Fitzhugh:   18,  243,  302,  303 

Lee,  Guy  Carleton:  165 

Lee,  Henry:   55,    56 

Lee,   Robert  E.:    56,  59,  94,  123, 

130,  178,  189,  194,  240-252,  266, 

267,  272 

Lee,  Stephen  D.:   243 

Lewis,  Andrew: 53 

Lincoln,  Abraham:  150,  156,  175, 

178,  180,  181,  192,  193,  196,  257, 

266,  267,  270,  271 

Lodge,  Henry  Cabot:   122 

London  Company:  25 

Longstreet,  James:   ...  .244,  257 
Louisiana:  effect  of  purchase 

of,    172 

secedes,    193 

Lowell,  James  Russell:    ...     77 

McClellan,  George  B.:    ..241-245 

McDowell:  battle  of, 260 

McDowell,  Grace  Greenlee:       63 

McDowell,  Joseph:    60 

Mclntosh,    Lachlan:     68,     69 

McKelway,  St.  Clair;    303 

McKinley,  William:    302 

Madison,  James:  20,    84 

Manassas:  battle  of, 243 

Marion,  Francis:   64,    66 

Marshall,  John:   ....53,  157,  158 
Marye's  Heights:  and  Chan- 

cellorsville,   245-247 

Maryland:      and     independ- 
ence,       47 

heroes  of,  . .  51,     52 
in    the   conven- 
tion of  1787,       79 
and  slavery,  . .  164 


INDEX 


315 


Maryland:    cedes    claim    to 

territory,    ...  167 
stays  in  Union,  193 

Lee  in, 244,  245 

"Maryland,   My  Maryland": 

244,  245 

Mason,  George :   49 

Massachusetts :  assembly  dis- 
solved,         38 

and  independence,  45 
and  Virginia,  ...75,  77 
and  states  rights, 

150,  152 

establishes  slavery,  162 
abolition  movement 

in,  166 

and  secession,  . .  182-185 
and  nullification,  . .  191 

Maury,  Dabney  H.:    130 

Meade,  George  G.:    247 

Mecklenburg      Declaration  : 

41,  42,     44 

Mercer,  C.  F. :   163 

Mercer,  Hugh:    57 

Mexican  War:    90,     96 

Mississippi:  in  Mexican  War,    94 

secedes,    193 

Missouri:   and  slavery  ques- 
tion,     172 

stays  in  Union,   193 

Mobile   Cadets:    202 

Monroe  Doctrine:     90 

Monroe,  James:  90,     97 

Monuments    and    Histories: 

236-239 
Moore's  Creek :  battle  of,  . .     61 

Morgan,   Daniel :     53-55 

Morgan,  John  H.:    ..64,  263,  264 
Mosby,  John  S. :    64 


Motte,  Rebecca:   68 

Moultrie,  William :  63,    64 

Municipal  Corruption:    ....  300 

Nash,  Francis :    6  J 

Navigation  Laws:   31 

Negro    Questions:    and    the 

constitution 82 

in  the  South,    ..291-296 
New  England:   and  War  of 

1812,  88-90 

in  Mexican  War,  . .     95 

settlers  in,    119,  120 

and   states  rights,     151 

slavery  in,   162 

threatens  secession,  172 
pioneers     of     seces- 
sion,    181-185 

nullification,    ...189-192 

New  Orleans:    233 

News  and  Courier:  227 

New    York:    and    independ- 
ence,        48 

North  Carolina:  and  Tryon,    30 

aids  Boston,    39 

first  blood  spilt  in,  40 
and  Mecklenburg 

Declaration,    ..41,    42 
Provincial  Congress 

of,   42 

and      independence, 

45,    47 

heroes  of,   59,    63 

University   of,    60 

in     convention     of 

1787 79 

adopts  constitution,  83 
in  Mexican  War,  . .  94 
and  slavery, 164 


316 


HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 


North  Carolina:   and  eman- 
cipation,    170 

secedes, 193 

Norfolk:  burned,  46 

North,  The:   in  the  revolu- 
tion,   73,    74 

in  the  War  of  1812, 

88-90 
pronunciation  in,  . .  106 

and  slavery,    127 

differences    between 

the  South  and,  147-149 
and    states    rights, 

150-158 

slavery  in,   162-164 

sells  slaves,   165-167 

imports  slaves,  166,  168 

nullifies,    189-192 

Northwest  Territory:    ...58,  167 

Nullification:   defined,    156 

advocated  by  Jeffer- 
son  157,  158 

threatened  in  South 

Carolina,   159 

by   the   North,   161, 

162,  173,  189,  192 

"Ole  Marster":   111-114 

"Ole  Mistis":    114-116 

Omnibus  Bill:    191 

"Order  Number  28":    233 

Otis,  James:   32 

Page,  Thomas  Nelson:  144 

Parsons  Cause :   33,    34 

Pendleton,  W.  N.:    243 

Pennsylvania:  and  Independ- 
ence,       48 

Personal  Liberty  Bills:  173,  191 


Pettigrew,  J.  J.:   242,  248 

Pickens,  Andrew:  66,    67 

Pickett,  George  E.:    248 

Pinckney,      Charles      Cotes- 
worth:   157 

"Pirates":    208-212 

Planter   Civilization:    ...116-119 
Planter,  The  "lazy":    ...138-141 

Planters:     134-138 

Pocahontas:    24 

Point  Pleasant:  battle  of,  . .     52 

Polk,  Thomas:    42 

Pope,  John:    243 

Port  Republic:  battle  of,  ..  261 

Press,  Philadelphia:    303 

Prisons:  in  the  North 127 

in  the  South 128 

Private    Soldier,    The:    and 

the   Sailor,    197-212 

Puritan  and  Cavalier: 

119-123;   147-149 

Quakers:  petition  of 167 

Quartering  Act:  37 

Quincy,    Josiah:    ..155,  183,  184 

Race  Problem:    291-296 

Randolph,  Edmund:    79 

Randolph,  John:    152 

Randolph,  Peyton:    35 

Rawle,  William:   189 

Rawlings,  Moses :    52 

Rebellion,  Bacon's:    28,    29 

Rebellion:    Records   of  the, 

194,  211 

Reconstruction :     287-291 

Recruiting   Officer:    216,  217 

Redemptioners:    165 

Religious  Liberty:    61,    85 


INDEX 


317 


Revolutionary  War:    troops 

and   battles,   72,    74 

Rhode  Island:  and  religious 

freedom,   50 

Richmond  Blues:    202 

Roanoke  Island :   23 

Roanoke  Island,  St.  Augus- 
tine, and  Jamestown:    ..21-26 

Robertson,  James:   45,    71 

Rockbridge  Artillery:    206 

Roosevelt,  Theodore:  45,  71, 

72,  83,  95,  122,  159,  201,  202 
Rutherford,  Griffith:    61 

Sailors:  in  the  War  of  1812, 

89,    90 
Sailor,  The:  and  the  private 

Soldier,    197-212 

St.  Augustine:    22 

St.  John's  Church:    41 

Sansom,  Emma:    218 

Scalawag:    280-284 

Schoolmarm    in    Tradition: 

275-277 

Secession:  in  1787, 83 

and  Texas,   91 

first  speech  in  con- 
gress on 155 

early  believers  in,   156 
threatened  by   New 

England,    172 

by  the  South,  ..179,  180 
the  right  of,  ...181-192 
Northern  advocates 

of,    182-189 

threatened  by  Mas- 
sachusetts  185 

taught      at      West 
Point,    188,  189 


Secession:  name  of  the  war 

of,   195 

doctrine  abandoned,  269 

Semmes,  Raphael :    209 

Seven  Days'  Battles;    ...241-242 

Seymour,  Horatio:   184,  185 

Sharpsburg,  battle  of;    244 

"Sheridan's  Ride":   231 

Sherman,  W.  T.:    230 

Shiloh  and  its  Heroes:    262-265 

Shiloh:   battle  of 264 

"Sic  Semper  Tyrannis":    ..27-36 

Simms,  William  Gilmore:  ..  221 

Slavery:   and  Texas,  92,  93,  160 

in  the  North,  ...  127 

in  the  South,  131-134 

and  religion,  143, 

168,  169 

cause  of  war,  . . .  161 
abolished    in    the 

North 161 

established         by 

Massachusetts,..  162 
in  the  North  and 

the  South,..   162-164 
and  Virginia, 

163,  164,  166 
and  Federal  ratio,  168 

abolition  of,    169 

moral    side    of,    ..171 
and  Missouri  Com- 
promise  172 

and       California, 

175,  176 
extinguished     by 

war,    196 

surrendered        by 

South 269 

Slaves:  treatment  of 134-138 


318 


HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 


Slaves :   number  of 164 

insurrections  of,165,  166 

runaway,    168 

Slave  Trade:    164,  166,  167 

Smith,  Goldwin:     on    seces- 
sion   188 

Smith,  John:    24 

Smith,  Kirby  E.:   266 

SmaHwood,  William:    51 

South  Carolina :  and  the  con- 
gress of  1765,  ..35,  36 

aids  Boston 39 

provincial  Congress 

of,     44,     45 

and      independence, 

46-48 

heroes  of 63-68 

in    the    Revolution, 

73,    76 
in     convention     of 

1787,  79 

in  Mexican  War,  ..     94 

divorce  in 120 

and  states  rights,  . .  152 
and  nullification,  . .  159 

and  slavery,    ..163,  164 
threatens     nullifica- 
tion  190,  192 

secedes, 193 

Sherman's        March 

through 231 

during     reconstruc- 
tion  283,  284 

South,  The:    in  olden  days, 

15-97 

no   solid,    17-19 

and  the  constitution 
of  1787,  20 


South,  The:  and  continental 

congress,    36 

in  the  Revolution,  51-78 
and  the  constitution, 

78-86 

and  the  Union,  86-97 

and  Texas,    .  .92,  93,    96 
literature  unjust  to, 

98-104 

English   of,    105,  106 

the  ante-bellum,  111 

in   1860,    116,  117 

yeomanry   of,    ..123,  126 
education   in,    ..125,  126 

slavery  in,  • 131-134 

ill-feeling       towards 

the  North 147-150 

and  states  rights,  150-158 
outvoted  in  Congress,  160 

and  slaves,  162-164 

secedes,    179 

war  poets  of,    . .  222,  223 
since  the  war,  ...266-304 
Southern    Literary    Messen- 
ger:      101 

Stamp  Act:   34,36,    37 

Stamp  Act  Congress:    ...35,    36 
"Starvation    Parties":    ..223-225 

States  Rights:    150-158 

Stephens,  Alex.  H.:  193,  199 

"Stonewall":    (See  Jackson, 
T.  J.) 

Stowe,  Mrs.  H.  B 77,  176 

Stuart,  J.  E.  B.: 

178,  242,  246,  247,  251 

Sumter,  Fort:    67 

Sumter,  Thomas:    66 

Taney,  Roger  B.:    177 


INDEX 


319 


Tariff:    158,  159 

"Taxation  without  Represen- 
tation":     30-33 

Taylor,  Richard:    257,  266 

Tea  Parties:   Boston,   ...38,  39 

Annapolis,   39 

Charleston 39 

Tennessee;    settled   by  Rob- 
ertson,      45,  71 

Telfair,  Edward:    43 

Texas:   and  Mexico,   91,  92 

and  slavery,  92 

secedes,   193 

the  hero  of, 262,  263 

Text-books:       misstatements 

in,    ;  132,  133 

Thirteenth  Amendment:    ..  278 

Townshend  Acts:    37 

Tryon,  Gov. :   30 

Tyler,   John:    92,  163 

Tyler,  Lyon  G.:    163 

Uncle  Tom's  Cabin:  47,  101, 

132,  135,  138,  142-144,  176 
"Underground  Railroad":   ..  173 
Underwood  Convention:    ...  286 
Union:    created  by  states,  83-86 
maintained    and    ex- 
panded by  South,  ..86-97 

love  for  the,    301-304 

University  of  Virginia:  108,  206 

Valley  Campaign:    260,  261 

Virginia:    and  Five  Resolu- 
tions,   34,     35 

and   Carolina,    ..36,     44 
and    committees    of 

correspondence,  . .     40 
and      independence, 

46,  47,    48 


Virginia:  and  Bill  of  Rights,    49 

heroes,   52-59 

in     convention     of 

1787 79 

and  Connecticut,  . .     82 
settled  by  Cavaliers, 

120,  121 
aristocrats   in,    124,  125 

and  her  debt 129 

and  states  rights, 

152,  154 

slavery  in 162,  163 

cedes     Northwest 

Territory,    167 

constitutional     con- 
vention of  1829,  .  170 
and    Massachusetts, 

75,     77 
and  nullification, 

191,  192 

secedes 193 

atrocities  in 231 

Underwood     Consti- 
tution,      286 

Virginia:    and  Monitor:    209-212 
Virginia  and  Kentucky  Res- 
olutions :    191 

Virginia  Military  Institute: 

231,  241,  254 

War  between  the  States:  be- 
fore the,   15-17 

causes:    146,  150 

slavery  question,  ..  161 

name  adopted 19a 

cost  of,  267 

War  of  1812:    86-90,  306 

War  Poets:    222,  223 

Washington  Artillery: 

202,  244,  245 


320 


HALF-HOURS  IN  SOUTHERN  HISTORY 


Washington,  George: 

39,  59,  85,  157,  257 
Washington,  William:  ..55,  56 
Webster,  Daniel:  denounced 

by  Whittier,   174 

Westmoreland  Club:   298 

West  Point:  secession  taught 

at,  188,  189 

Wheeler,  Joseph :    264 

Wilderness:    battle    of   the, 

250,  251 


William  and  Mary  College: 

26,  107,  206,  231 
Williams,  Otho  Holland:    ..     52 

Williams,  Roger:   50 

Wilmer,  Bishop  R.  H.: 

131,  132,  142,  143 

Winchester:   battle  of,   261 

Women  of  the  Confederacy: 

213-240 

Woodford,  William:   53 

Wyatt,  Sir  Francis:   25 


UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA,  LOS  ANGELES 

THE  UNIVERSITY  LIBRARY 
This  book  is  DUE  on  the  last  date  stamped  below 


ocr 


*? 


MAY23195C 
VIAY?     2195-!.. 


OCT  1  6  1953 

•AY  i  2  ,'iS 

OCT  - 1 


FEB1472 


^  «GRD 

Q/.  - 
^^•* 


LD-URL 

ft    0£C    974 

DEC  5  "1974 


MAR  i5id7/ 


MAR  ^  < 


-  •  II  Kill  fllfl  If/JI  llf  Jl  mil  ||lj 


